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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



IVeligious Delusions 



A Psychic Study 



BY 

J. V. COOMBS 

Author of "Campaigning for Christ" 




C INC INN A TI 
THE STANDARD PUBLISHING COMPANY 

Publishers of Christian Literature 



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5 

Two Oopic^ H 

FEB 16 1905 

Copyrigiii t<iiry 

J~H^L 7 /3 / KjOtj- 

CUSS -W AAc, Nn 

x cofJy b. 



Copyright, 1904, 
By J. V. Coombs. 



TO 

my wife, Allie D. 

and my daughter Veda V. 

who assisted me in preparing this work 

this volume is affectionately 

Dedicated. 

J. V. C. 



PREFATORY. 

Many people have neither time nor opportunity to 
study the ponderous volumes upon Psychic Phenomena ; 
yet they desire to be informed upon these subjects. This 
volume has been prepared to meet their wants. The au- 
thor has read the reports of the London Psychic Research 
Society, the report of the Seybert Commission, the great 
works of Profs. Hudson, Carpenter and Grimes ; Drs. 
Bernheim and Moll and indeed all the valuable works 
bearing upon these subjects, and classified and arranged 
this material in such a way that anyone in a few hours' 
reading can familiarize himself with the subjects dis- 
cussed. For four years he has been classifying these data. 
To get the data, facts, and history on Spiritualism the 
author has culled from thousands of pages and arranged 
these facts in such a way that any reader can meet and 
defeat this delusion. In a few hours' study anyone can 
understand the law of mental healing and be prepared 
to expose the fallacies of Christian Science and kindred 
cults. All that is necessary for anyone to know in order 
to understand and practice hypnotism can be found in 
this volume. More wonderful discoveries in Psychic Phe- 
nomena will be made in the next ten years than have 
been made in Natural Phenomena within the last fifty 
years. The understanding of these subjects will banish 
delusions from civilized communities. 

J. V. COOMBS. 

Indianapolis. 



CONTENTS 

Page. 

Superstition ..'..... I 

Witchcraft . / .-. 13 

Mohammedism 18 

Adventism 22 

Mormonism 36 

1. History 2>7 

2. Was Jos. Smith a Prophet ? 50 

3. Was. Jos. Smith a Polygamist ? 67 

4. The Book of Mormon Contradicts the Bible 75 

The Power of the Mind 86 

Hypnotism 92 

1. Who can be Hypnotized ? 93 

Spiritualism no 

Mental Medicine 135 

Christian Science 152 

Some Latter Day Delusions 167 

Common Sense in Religion 173 

The Gospel of Christ a Cure for all Delusions 177 

The Conclusion 184 



CHAPTER I. 

SUPERSTITION. 

Superstition and fraud are the principal sources of 
delusions. It is, therefore, important to discuss super- 
stitions before we investigate the cause of religious de- 
lusions. 

Superstition has made much of our history and litera- 
ture, and created one-half of the world's beliefs. 

It comes to us in two forms : 

One comes in the charming form of fancy, where moon- 
lit dells are filled with dancing fairies. The other appears 
as a black raven of terror, where consort goblins, ghosts 
and devils to plan mischief. Imagination has ever been 
the great myth maker. It has given the world all the 
folk-lore of childhood and peopled the air with mysteri- 
ous spirits. Superstition created witchcraft, spiritualism, 
hobgoblins, harpies, hags and spooks. 

The mysterious brooded over us in the cradle as the 
nurse in her lullaby, sang of fairies. It charmed us later 
when the chimney-corner stories were told about imps, 
lying in ambush for bad boys. 

We were told about Santa Claus, Kris Kringle, Spindle- 
shanked-goggle-eyed Brownies and old Blue Beard. 

Against this harmless child-lore we are not contending. 
Our opposition is against the terrors of superstition. 

Delusions often command a respectful standing because 
they are not understood. Because they are not compre- 
hended they are surrounded with mystery. Whatever 
they could not understand, the superstitious declared to 
be spirits. 

The formula stood: 

''If that is not a spirit, what is it? 
I don't know ; therefore it is a spirit." 

What a contradiction! What a travesty upon logic! 



2 SUPERSTITION. 

To affirm because we do not know what a manifestation 
is, that we do know what it is, has led multitudes into 
darkness. Mohammed, Joseph Smith, Ellen White, and 
Spiritualists had visions and saw shining lights. They 
said, "If this is not the Spirit of God what is it? I do 
not know, therefore it is the Spirit of God." Upon this 
flimsy foundation Mohammedism, Mormonism, Spirit- 
ualism, Adventism, Christian Science and other occults 
are builded. The superstitious are ready victims for the 
imposter ; hence they go together. 

The superstitious believed that everything that hap- 
pened was caused by some devil, goblin or ghost. All' 
phenomena were caprices of malign spirits. These evil 
spirits, citizens of the air, produced every calamity. The 
air swarmed with imps, hobgoblins, vampires and mischief 
makers. Disease, misfortune, war, pestilence, earth- 
quakes, storms, floods, insanity, idiocy, epilepsy, sickness 
and death were produced by hags, harpies and demons, 
who delighted in torturing mortals here below. 

Evil spirits were not only all around us but in us. The 
nightmare was a night demon. 

The man with the ague had a devil in him, shaking 
him for his meanness. Dethroned gods, semi-gods and 
hideous deformed imps peopled the air, lurked in the 
forests and mountains, skulked around haunted houses 
and graveyards, and ventured out at the dusk of the 
evening to torment poor weak humanity. They could 
assume any shape. The witch could contract until she 
could slip out at the keyhole, with the key in the hole. 
They were visible or invisible just as they liked. 

Some walked the earth as great giants with bloody 
throats ; others came in the form of a cat, a dog, a goat, 
a pig without legs, a hound with a sharp head like an ax ; 
others came in the shape of a gnat or rat. The devil 
often to disturb women came in the shape of a pretty man. 
In this form he is still bewitching women. A pretty man 
is worthless anywhere. 



SUPERSTITION. 3 

What awful things we say about the Devil. We call 
him old Nick, because Nickkar means black like the raven. 
We call him old Hairy, because we think he is wooly and 
hairy. We name him old Scratch, because we think he 
has hoofs, horns and claws as we used to see him in pic- 
tures in the Bible. 

Ancient lore tells us that the devil organized a school, 
in a subterranean cavern, to train witches and wizards 
how to torture men. On graduation day, he did not have 
his pupils to make speeches, but all the members of the 
senior class were compelled to run through a narrow 
cavern. If the devil could seize the last one he had him 
for his servant. Hence the phrase : "The Devil takes 
the hindmost." 

Nothing was natural these days. The whirlwind was 
caused by the flight of demons. The gnawing of some 
vampire caused the pains and aches of the body. 

A volcano belched forth. "What is that? I don't 
know, therefore it is the snorting of a mad devil." The 
eclipse of the sun was caused by the spreading of the 
wings of some Monster Spirit. To appease the wrath 
of these maddened demons was the chief business of the 
people. Medicine men spent their time driving away 
devils by incantations and casting out demons. 

Popes issued bulls against comets, and councils ex- 
communicated eclipses by denouncing them and forbid- 
ding them to remain any longer. 

Evil spirits sent the frost that nipped the corn. Ghosts 
killed cattle and raised the storms. The old time Chari- 
vari originated from the custom of making hideous noises 
to drive away bad spirits. 

The second position taken by the superstitious was as 
follows : "God causes all things. All natural phenomena 
are the works of God." The superstitious said God sent 
pestilence to punish us for our sins. He sent calamity 
to make us love him. 

Destruction of crops, frosts, comets and sickness were 



4 SUPERSTITION. 

warnings. God was a God of torture as well as a God of 
love. Children died to punish the parents for their sins. 
It is not unusual now to hear ministers at funerals tell 
people that God has taken away their little babe as a warn- 
ing. This is a lingering superstition. God does not kill 
children to warn parents of sin. God does not burn up 
cities to alarm men. Of course these superstitions belong 
to the ignorant. Our superstitions do not rise up to the 
majestic dignity of the olden times when old women went 
flying through the air on broomsticks in their nocturnal 
serenades, but we do not like to see the moon over the 
left shoulder, or see a bird fly through the house. We are 
not superstitious. We are just a little peculiar. We do 
not like to turn back to get some article after we start on 
a journey; for Lot's wife, looked back and became salt. 

We still cling to the bad omen of unlucky Friday, be- 
cause the Savior was crucified on that day. It is danger- 
ous to sit with thirteen at the table, for there were thir- 
teen at the supper with Christ and one was a traitor. 

We deny that we are superstitious and yet we do not 
like to see a cat cross the road when we start out on a 
journey, or a squirrel on the left hand side, or to cross 
when four hands shake, or to begin work on Friday, or 
pay debts on Monday or marry on the 13th. 

Many farmers plant potatoes in the moon, instead of in 
the ground. Neither would they set a hen on an odd 
number of eggs. We are not superstitious, but we believe 
in signs and omens. 

The moon upside down means dry weather. 

We will not engage in special work or move on Fri- 
day. If thirteen sit at the same table one will die some- 
time, 

A howling dog under the window of the sick forebodes 
death. Still we whistle when we go through a grave- 
yard. We still believe the clock stops when some one 
dies. 

The ringing of the dumb-bell in the ear admonishes us 



SUPERSTITION. 5 

of coming troubles. When we see a white horse we look 
for the red-headed girl. We still lay the head of the 
dead towards the east. 

Shakespeare refers to this custom when he says : "W r e 
must lay his head toward the east, my father has reasons 
for it." 

The horse-shoe wards off disease, enemies and calama- 
ties, hence it is lucky to have one over the door. 
Wives and maidens consult fortune tellers. 
If a man's nose Itches he will have trouble. 
If a woman's nose itches she will 
"See a stranger, 
Kiss a fool 
Or be in danger." 
Most women go through these three stages every 
dav. If the ear burns some one is talking about you. 
"If the dish cloth falls 
A stranger calls," 
and the young girl says it will be her beau. 
"If it rains before seven, 

It will clear before eleven." 
"You can't tell before two, 
What it is going to do." 
The third time is charming. 
The destiny of children depends upon their birth. 
"Monday's child is full of grace, 
Tuesday's child is fair in face, 
Wednesday's child is full of woe, 
Thursday's child has far to go, 
Friday's child works hard for a living, 
Saturday's child is loving and giving, 
And the child that is born on Christmas day is fair, 
and wise and good and gay." 
The deportment of girls decides their future. 
"Whistling girls and crowing hens 
Always come to no good ends." 



6 SUPERSTITION. 

"A whistling woman and crowing hen, 
Are neither fit for God or men." 
Marriage and courtship are surrounded with myths 
and charms. We try our fortunes by opening the Bible 
by chance, and if the passage, "And it came to pass," is 
on the page, our wish will come true. 

The girl catches the lady bug, tosses it in the air, thinks 
of two young men and says : 

"Fly away east, or fly away west, 
Show me where lives the one I love best." 
Many a maiden has tossed a grain of corn or a nut 
upon the fire and said as she named it : 
"If he loves me pop and fly, 
If he hates me, burn and die." 
She did this only for fun, but by all means preferred to 
see the corn pop. What a charm follows the four-leaf 
clover. 

"A clover, a clover for two, 
Put it in your shoe, 
The first man you meet 
In field, street or lane, 
You'll get him or one of his name." 
Should she meet Smith or Jones the omen would not 
mean much now. 

Where is the youth that has not counted the apple seeds. 
"One I love, two I love, three I love I say, 
Four I love with all my heart, 
Five I cast away. 

Six he loves, seven she loves, eight both love. 
Nine he comes, ten he tarries, 
Eleven he courts, and twelve he marries." 
This was only pastime, but many a girl has looked shy 
at the youth for whom she named her apple that had 
eight seeds in it, both loved. Many a maiden has buried 
her face in the pillows and cried all night because her 
apple had only five seeds. 

The wish-bone of a chicken has made many matches. 



SUPERSTITION. 7 

We are not superstitious, but Friday is the fairest or 
foulest of the week. 

If it rains on Monday it will rain three days in suc- 
cession. 

Sing before you eat and you will cry before you sleep. 

Now how foolish these signs and omens are, and yet 
they shape many lives. To argue against them is to of- 
fend many good people who have noticed that these signs 
never fail. 

Yet these so-called harmless signs, presentiments and 
dreams have given birth to many epidemic delusions that 
have tortured humanity. A captain refused to go out of 
port because he saw a mysterious shooting star. 

A prominent lady refused to embark on a trip across the 
ocean when all arrangements had been made, because there 
was a death on board that day. Foot-ball teams, base- 
ball teams, naval officers and soldiers want a mascot to 
keep off bad luck and defeat. If they forget their mascot 
they are sure to be hoodooed. By the way, hoodoo is 
a corruption of the voodoo of the ignorant negroes of the 
south, and voodoo is old time witchcraft. But a few 
months ago a negro boy of Louisiana was killed because 
he hoodooed his companions. 

In almost every community there are wart charmers. 
People have faith in them. To oppose them as frauds 
is to offend many superstitious persons. In every village 
there is the old hag fortune teller. Under the advice of 
these fortune tellers many girls are led into vice and 
degredation. 

In Boston 15,000 people visit these frauds. They pay 
$500,000 annually for prying into the future. It is a re- 
proach upon the character of any woman to visit these de- 
ceivers and frauds. 

Virgil's description of the ancient harpies is applic- 
able to the slimy fortune teller. 

"When from the mountains with hideous cry, 
And clattering wings the filthy harpies fly, 



8 SUPERSTITION. 

Monsters more fierce offending heaven never sent 
From hell's abyss to human punishment; 
With virgin faces, but bodies obscene, 
With claws for hands, and looks forever lean." 
The poet describes the modern medium : 
"The hag is astride 
This night for a ride, 
And the devil and she together." 
The combination of the devil and the woman in pollut- 
ing the innocent is to be dreaded more than famine or war. 
All these things are relics of superstition. Supersti- 
tions that made witchcraft possible, witchcraft that mur- 
dered 5,000,00 innocent people. Superstition gave the 
world the craze about the philosopher's stone. Super- 
stition gave the world alchemy, or discovering the art 
of changing the cheap metals into gold, or to find the 
panacea for healing all diseases. 

Many of these delusions became epidemic and whole 
communities have gone mad. Christians and all sensible 
people should rise above all these foolish signs, omens 
and delusions, for they pave the way for dangerous delu- 
sions. 

There is much paganism in the church today. Holy 
water, visions, the wakes, relics, images, hearing noises 
and seeing messengers in our revival meetings are linger- 
ing superstitions. The ancient pagans painted the body. 
We paint the hair, cheeks, and mustache. They bored 
holes in their noses for rings ; we bore them in our ears. 

SUGGESTIONS, 

In order to find a working basis in discussing religious 
delusions, I have adopted the following rules : 

1. Take nothing for granted. We will hear of won- 
derful cures, dreams and manifestations. Investigate. 
Don't believe them. Nineteen out of twenty are exag- 
gerations. 



SUPERSTITION. 9 

2. These healers, fanatics and religious enthusiasts 
must not tell a commonplace story. No one will listen 
to it. Therefore they invariably tell an exaggerated story 
in order to get attention. 

3. Don't believe your best friend, not even your 
mother when she talks of the supernatural. Other good 
mothers and good friends have been mistaken. There are 
good people among the Mormons and Spiritualists, but 
they are deluded. 

4. Nothing can be known, except as we appeal to facts. 
Superstitions, inferences and guesses prove nothing. 

5. Because you cannot explain certain phenomena do 
not declare they are supermundane. No one has proved 
that disembodied spirits ever come to this world. 

6. Because the great mass of people believe a thing 
is true is no proof of its genuineness. Nearly all people 
once believed in witchcraft, alchemy, and that the air was 
peopled with goblins damned. If a whole community 
goes religiously crazy, don't follow the hallucination. 
Have courage to speak for truth. Vindication will come. 

I have offended many good people by rejecting some of 
their big stories. They will tell you "We know this is 
true," and that must end discussion or offend. Better 
offend than to accept such proof. A lady in a New York 
town said to me, "A girl was hypnotized in the town east 
of here, and never came to conscience. She died in the 
hypnotic state." 

I knew that was not true. As I was reading all the 
occult journals, I knew that case was imaginary. When I 
questioned the case, she became righteously indignant, a 
religious term for getting mad, and said, "I know what 
I am talking about, and I do not thank you for your in- 
sinuations. I knew the girl myself." When she had 
cooled, I said to her, "Now I am investigating this very 
subject. Here is a reward of $1,000 offered by the 
Psychic Society of one case where the subject died under 
hypnotic influence. You might get that reward. I am 



io SUPERSTITION. 

preparing a book. Can I quote you for authority. 
Quickly she replied, "No, do not do that, I have the story 
from my friend." I visited her friend who said, "Oh 
no, she did not die. A physician hypnotized her, went 
to see another patient expecting to return if needed. The 
mother became alarmed and sent for him, but before he 
arrived the girl awoke." 

We hear people tell stories where a hypnotist would 
go into an audience, snap his ringers under the nose of a 
man and command him to follow. All this is humbug. 
No man ever hypnotized a stranger without the consent 
of the subject. 

While at the table of a hotel I heard two enthusiasts 
talking about divine healing. One said, "Miss C. went 
to Mr. Dowie and was healed instantaneously. She was 
a hopeless cripple with a curvature of the spine. One 
of the vertebra was decayed." I said to him, "Do you 
know this lady?" "Perfectly well. I knew her when she 
was an invalid." He gave me her name and address. 
Luckily I knew a physician in that city. I wrote him at 
once. Here is his reply : "Miss C. is a nervous hysterical 
woman. I have treated her for nervousness. She is la- 
boring under the hallucination that she has spinal trouble. 
She wanted to go to Dowie and to satisfy the mind, we 
sent her. She came back apparently improved, but has 
relapsed and is in a more serious condition than ever." 

The story of "Three Black Crows" illustrates the spirit 
of exaggeration, coloring and misrepresentation. 

THREE BLACK CROWS. 

Two honest tradesmen meeting in the Strand, 
One took the other briskly by the hand ; 
"Hark ye," said he, " 'tis an odd story this, 
About the crows !" "I don't know what it is," 
Replied his friend. "No! I'm surprised at that, 
Where I come from it is the common chat : 



SUPERSTITION. II 

But you shall hear an odd affair indeed ! 
And that it happened, they are all agreed. 
Not to detain you from a thing so strange, 
A gentleman that lives not far from 'Change, 
This week, in short, as all the alley knows, 
Taking a pule, has thrown up three black crowj." 

"Impossible !" — "Nay, but it's really true, 
I had it from good hands, and so may you." 
"From who, I pray ?" So, having named the man, 
Straight to inquire, his curious comrades ran. 
"Sir, did you tell?" — relating the affair — 
"Yes, sir, I did ; and if it's worth your care, 
Ask Mr. Such-a-one, he told it me ; 
But, by the by, 'twas two black crows, not three." 

Resolved to trace so wondrous an event, 

Whip to the third, the virtuoso went. 

"Sir, — and-so-forth — "Why, yes, the thing's a fact, 

Though, in regard to numbers, not exact; 

It was not two black crows, 'twas only one ; 

The truth of that you may depend upon, 

The gentleman himself told me the case. 

"Where may I find him ?" — "Why — in such a place." 

Away he goes, and, having found him out — 

"Sir, be so good as to resolve a doubt." 

Then to his last informant, he referred, 

And begged to know if true, what he had heard. 

"Did you sir, throw up a black crow ?" "Not I !" 

"Bless me ! how people propagate a lie !. 

Black crows have been thrown up, three, two and one, 

And here I find, at last, all comes to none ! 

Did you say nothing of a crow at all ? 

Crow — crow — perhaps I might, now I recall 

The matter over." "And pray, sir, what was it?" 

"Why, I was horrid sick, and at the last 



12 SUPERSTITION. 

I did throw up, and told my neighbor so, 
Something that was as black, sir, as a crow." 

We reject the so-called revelations of Joseph Smith, 
Ellen White, Mohammed, Spiritualists and Mrs. Eddy 
because the Gospel of Jesus Christ is sufficient for all. He 
gave us perfect revelation. Nothing is to be added. We 
are to preach no other gospel. These prophets and pro- 
phetesses have not added one moral truth. There is 
nothing in any of their teaching to bless the world. Jesus 
gave us all moral truth. I challenge any one to show me 
one moral truth that has been given to the world, since 
the days of the Apostolic Church. When Christianity 
comes in contact with delusions Christianity grinds them 
to pieces. Delusions flourish where Christianity is in- 
active. For the first six centuries of the church, there 
were no delusions that disturbed the advance of Christi- 
anity. Today we are divided into waring factions and 
delusions flourish. 



CHAPTER II. 

WITCHCRAFT. 

The delusion of witchcraft originated from the twin 
sisters, ignorance and superstition. Its hideous form 
did not grow up in a day. Once there was a great gulf 
between the sorcery of the pagan and the mysticism of the 
Christian. Gradually the deformities of paganism and the 
myths of Christianity paved the way for the witchcraft 
mania. 

The mysterious was everywhere. The mountains, val- 
leys, and air were full of goblins damned. The circle of 
belief began to enlarge. At first the ignorant and super- 
stitious were annoyed by demons and ghosts. Then the 
delusion that the air was full of evil spirits to do harm to 
men, seized the common people. Finally it became an 
epidemic delusion. The educated, statesmen, philosophers, 
preachers and judges became advocates of witch trials. 
The people were divided into two classes : witches and 
witch-finders. The sleep of reason brought about these 
conditions. Men did not think. It was universally accept- 
ed that there were witches and wizards sending calamity, 
disease and death upon those people whom they despised. 
They never stopped to question the common notion that 
the witches went raising storms, blighting health, haunt- 
ing houses and killing children. Blackstone, the great- 
est legal mind of the world said : "To deny witchcraft is 
to deny the Word of God and the testimony of the ages." 

Chief Justice Matthew Hale, one of the greatest judges 
of all ages, sentenced women to death for witchery. 

Francis Bacon, Richard Baxter, Sir Walter Raleigh, 
Dr. Thomas Brown, John Calvin, Luther, Wesley, King 
James, and indeed all the preachers, lawyers, physicians, 
and judges arrayed themselves against witches. John 
Wesley protested against the repeal of the law against 



i 4 WITCHCRAFT. 

witchcraft. He said, "To give up witchcraft is in effect 
giving up the Bible." King James and all the potentates 
of Europe hastened to enact laws against witchcraft. The 
death penalty was to be inflicted upon all witches and wiz- 
ards. For two hundred years Europe went wild. Reason 
was asleep, and judgment dethroned. They charged 
witches with every crime. Witches caused epilepsy, in- 
sanity, pestilence, raised storms, bewitched cattle and 
children, drank with devils, ate with ghosts, debauched 
themselves with the devil, and consorted with Satan for 
the purpose of torturing and tormenting men. According 
to the superstitions of that day these devil-servers met 
often in the devil's council, called the devil's Sabbath, be- 
cause it was held on Saturday, the Sabbath. In this 
council they made hell-broth which would drive men into 
stupidity or insanity. Here they met to receive instruc- 
tions from Satan. He taught them how to do the devil's 
work and to plan mischief. Here upon the throne he 
heard the reports of those who had gone forth to do his 
bidding. Witches and wizards vied each other in trying 
to tell who had done the most meanness. The devil 
flogged all who could not relate deeds of evil. Some of 
the witches came to the council on broomsticks, others 
were carried on the backs of devils. In leaving their 
homes they went out through the key hole and returned 
through the chimney. Lest this obscene hag should be 
missed, the devil delegated an imp to assume her shape 
and occupy the bed until she returned. In this council 
the new members were initiated. They swore allegiance 
to Satan, and bartered away their souls, for which the 
devil gave them power to bewitch man and beast. They 
were required to kiss the devil. The devil sometimes 
tested the loyalty of his subjects, by pretending to be 
dead ; then all the hags and harpies, and goblins set up an 
awful wail that shook the mountains. The one that made 
the most hellish noise was rewarded by having the devil 
hug her. Everybody believed in these secret meetings of 



WITCHCRAFT. 15 

the demons. Laws were enacted to put to death all who 
attended. Tests were instituted to detect those who had 
been in council with these demons and ghosts. They threw 
the woman accused into a tank of water, if she sank and 
drowned she was innocent, and should receive a Christian 
burial. If she floated, she was guilty and should be 
burned to ashes. 

In Holland they tossed the accused into the sea. If 
innocent the person would sink to the bottom. If guilty 
they would swim to shore, only to meet death at the hand 
of the executioner. 

Every misfortune was caused by a witch, and every 
sick child or animal was bewitched. Everybody was on 
the alert, looking for witches, for they began to roam 
about dusk. Some came forth rattling their chains, 
which meant they had escaped from purgatory. Witches 
were responsible for all calamities and sickness. A 
preacher had a headache. He declared he was bewitched. 
His devout flock went forth to find the witch. The crime 
was fastened upon an old woman. She confessed. She 
said she took her hatchet, went to his bed, and hit his 
skull, but that it was too hard to crack. There were 
hard-headed preachers then as now. This poor deluded 
creature was hanged for trying to crack the skull of a 
man. In Germany a woman was condemned because she 
turned an actor into an ass. The inventions of men were 
turned into devices of torture. The accused were placed 
upon the rack, cast into dark dungeons, where they were 
chained to the slimy wall for days. If they did not con- 
fess they were placed on the rack. The judge would 
then ask, ''Are you guilty?" "No." "Turn the wheel 
again." The poor creature would be stretched until half 
unconscious. "Now will you confess?" "No." "Turn 
the wheel again." The bones were dislocated and the 
spirit went home to God. Sometimes the accused were 
tied to posts, and the hateful revolving spoon placed in 
front of them. Each revolution the spoon dipped closer 



16 WITCHCRAFT. 

to the eyes of the man under torture. "Will you now con- 
fess ?" "I am not guilty." The next revolution touched 
the eye. The blood flowed ; refusing to acknowledge his 
guilt, the accuser shouted, "Turn the wheel vigorously." 
Two revolutions and both eyes were cut out. In England 
Mrs. Balfour was accused of witchcraft. On oath she 
denied. They put her feet in the iron boots and heated 
them to white heat. She refused to lie. They brought 
her husband and placed him on the rack. That failed. 
They then brought her son, put his feet in the iron boots, 
wedges were placed on each side, and fifty-seven mallet 
strokes were delivered upon the wedges, that crushed 
the bones and marrow. Still she would not confess. Last 
her little daughter was tortured in the presence of the 
mother. The cursed thumb-screw was placed upon the 
little girl's hands. The blood burst from the veins. The 
mother could not endure this atrocity. She confessed 
and was burned to ashes, because she was a witch. 

The story of the Salem witchcraft is one black spot in 
our history. In 1692 scores were cast into prison, and 
twenty persons put to^death. Bridget Bishop was hanged 
in June; Sarah Good and Rebecca Nuse in July; George 
Burroughs, John Procter, George Jacobs, John Willard 
and others in August. The people of Salem then went 
mad. The jails were full of the accused. Old Giles Cory 
was placed upon a table, another table was placed upon 
him, rocks were piled upon the table and he was pressed 
to death. 

These murders were done in the name of law and re- 
ligion. 

In England 30,000 were put to death for witchcraft. 
Holland and Germany vied with England. We are not 
very proud of our ancestors. In two hundred and fifty 
years not fewer than 5,000,000 persons gave up their 
lives on account of this witch mania. Most of these peo- 
ple were executed either upon the testimony of good wit- 
nesses, or upon their own confessions. The hallucina- 



WITCHCRAFT. 17 

tion went so far that no one was safe, and evidence was of 
no value. The highly. excited frenzy could see anything. 
Twenty witnesses testified in an English court that they 
saw an old woman walk out upon the sea, capsize a ship 
and drown all on board. The innocent old woman was put 
to death. 

In Germany ten witnesses swore that they saw ten 
persons on the back of the devil, flying over the city. 
They recognized five persons. Upon this evidence the 
five were hanged. In Sweden a council of ministers gave 
evidence that they saw an old woman turn herself into a 
dog. Did these people see these spirits, hags and witches ? 
They were honest, truthful men. Did they lie? Certainly 
not. Did they see the devil playing with witches? Cer- 
tainly, in the same way that the drunkard sees snakes, the 
maniac sees his dead mother, or the spiritualist sees the 
spirits of the dead. They saw these witches in their 
mind's eye. We can see just what we are looking for. 
The hypnotic subject sees the bees, the drunkard fights 
the demons and snakes, the spiritualist sees the spirits of 
the dead and the deluded of the seventeenth century saw- 
ghosts and witches. The whole excitement of witches and 
wizards was a delusion and a fraud. There is not a school 
boy in our land who does not ridicule the story of witch- 
craft. Millions believed in witches two hundred years 
ago. Today no one believes in them. 

But the evidence for the witch mania is far more tang- 
ible than the fraud and delusion of spiritualism, yet hun- 
dreds in the sunlight of the twentieth century visit spirit- 
ualistic mediums, seances and fortune tellers. 

Why did the accused confess ? will be asked. Did they 
falsify? Certainly not. Epidemic alarm startled all. 
The common conception of the devil's council was believed 
by all. Everybody believed there were hags and harpies. 
Any body at any time might be bewitched and carried off 
to the assembly of witches. Alarmed and nervous women 
would dream that they flew through the air, and visited 



18 WITCHCRAFT. 

the council of Satan. On awakening they remembered 
the dreams and believed them to be realities. They re- 
membered the hideous faces and the hell-resounding 
laugh of the devil. This dream became a fact to them. 
When our children dream that they see horses flying, we 
tell them it is only a dream. But in the superstitious days 
their dreams were facts. All dreams, hallucinations and 
visions were realities. Thoughts were things. The mind 
created the image by imagination, and declared the im- 
age to be a realty. Thought was dethroned, judgment 
had fled and reason had gone to sleep. Joan of Arc was 
put to death because the logic of the day said she was a 
witch. Shall we be too severe with these people? Are 
we free from all delusions ? In wild excitement under the 
preaching of a magnetic orator, the singing of songs, 
and the praying of the people some one swoons. "If that 
is not the Spirit of God, what is it? I don't know. 
Therefore it is the work of the spirit." Go cautiously 
here. Is this not mere fancy and fear, instead of conver- 
sion and pardon? 

We have seen enough of superstition and delusion, Let 
us now turn away from all these black arts, and put our 
faces Zionward. Because we can not understand phe- 
nomenon let us be slow to call it supernatural. That 
was the awful mistake of the witch-hunter, Joseph Smith, 
Ellen White, Mohammed, the medium, the fanatic to- 
day who imagines he sees visions and hears noises. 

It is eminently the duty of Christians to rise above all 
these notions, about omens, signs, and presentiments. 
It is not uncommon to hear one say, "Oh I feel that some- 
thing dreadful is going to happen." God has wisely kept 
the future from us. If we could see the future we would 
not be happy. If we could look one year into the com- 
ing days, we might see the hearse in front of our door, 
and a coffin in the home. It is folly to pry into the here- 
after, God only sees coming events. 



CHAPTER III. 

MOHAMMEDISM. 

Standing on the verge of the seventh century, at what- 
ever point of the compass we turn the eye, we see the 
approach of change. 

In the east the Church was torn asunder by divisions 
and weakened by luxury. 

Greedy for wealth, the Jew had forgotten his religion. 
The Persians worshiped the fire. The Arabians the stars, 
and the Egyptians the sacred animals. 

Turning toward the southeast we see the rise of the first 
great imposter, Mohammed. He was born in Mecca in 
Arabia, 569 A. D. Bold, audacious and chivalric he 
among ignorant people, became a prophet. He must have 
some apparent divine sanction for his religion. He had 
epileptic fits. He said these fits were trances and that 
God revealed to him wonderful things. Daily he went 
to the cave to pray and receive revelations from God. 

He labored four years to make nine converts. In six 
years he had forty followers and most of them his rela- 
tives. Persecution drove him from Mecca to Medina, 
622 A. D., where in ten years he obtained 120,000 fol- 
lowers. Persecution always makes a cause prosper. He 
tells us how he obtained the material for his book, the 
Koran. 

The doctrines of Mohamemdism are contained in the 
Koran which Mohammed says was delivered to him by 
the angel Gabriel. Mohammed relates the story as fol- 
lows : "On a dark and silent night, a night when there 
were no crowing of cocks, barking of dogs, or howling 
of wild beasts, while reposing in my bed at Mecca the 
angel Gabriel appeared to me." All these imposters have 
visions and see angels. He obeyed the angel which car- 
ried him to Jerusalem, in the twinkling of an eye. Here, 



20 MOHAMMEDISM. 

he left his beast, and in company with Gabriel ascended 
to the first heaven where he saw a rooster ten thousand 
miles high, and so loud did he crow that all creatures in 
heaven and on earth heard him, save man, who was robbed 
of this sweet music. I never read this story but what I 
think this bird would make a good mascot for an Ameri- 
can political campaign. In the seventh heaven he saw 
seventy thousand angels, on each angel seventy thousand 
heads, in each head seventy thousand mouths, in each 
mouth seventy thousand tongues, on each tongue seventy 
thousand praises for God and Mohammed. 

In the first heaven he saw Adam, who rejoiced to meet 
his son Mohammed. In the second heaven he met Noah, 
in the third Abraham, in the fourth Jacob, in the fifth 
Elijah, in the sixth John the Baptist, in the seventh Jesus. 
Leaving Jesus and the angel in the seventh heaven, he 
went to the throne of God and entered into familiar con- 
versation with the Almighty, who gave him the material 
for the Koran. This imposture is to show that he was 
above Jesus, for he left Jesus in the seventh heaven. 
Every prophet from that time has made himself above 
Christ. The impostor comes with knowledge that Jesus 
did not have. 

He now gave out that his religion was to be propagated 
by the sword. All Arabia surrenders to the onward 
march of the soldiers of the prophet. The brave Scythi- 
ans burned their idols at the command of the prophet. 
He was marching grandly on to conquest when death 
claimed its own, and Mohammed was no more. 

Thus perished the most successful impostor that ever 
lived. He laid the foundation for an empire that con- 
quered more territory in eighty years than Rome had con- 
quered in eight centuries, an empire stretching from India 
to the Atlantic. 

One good strong sermon, clearly showing that the Gos- 
pel of Christ is sufficient for all, would have defeated Mo- 
hammed. Instead of showing that all prophecies had 



MOHAMMEDISM. 21 

ended, that Jesus had come and given us a perfect law, 
they persecuted. The Gospel is the power that must yet 
defeat Mohammedism. 

The signal for the overthrow of Mohammedism is at 
hand. When the Green banner of Mohammedism will 
surrender to the Golden Cross of Christ, the dark valleys 
of ignorance and superstition will be filled with intelli- 
gence and truth, the doctrines of the Koran will give way 
to the teachings of Jesus, and the prophet of Mecca will 
surrender to the prophet of Nazareth. 



CHAPTER IV. 

SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 

From the days of our Savior prophets have proclaimed 
the second advent of the Christ. Ann Lee, Swedenborg, 
William Miller, Ellen White and others have set times 
when the Lord would come. Seventh-Day Adventists 
originated in the movement of William Miller, who was 
born 1 781 in Massachusetts. In 1833, in Low Hampton, 
N. Y., he began to preach that the end of the world was 
at hand. He set the date October 10, 1843. Thousands 
turned to this cry of warning and in ten years perhaps 
one hundred thousand people became Adventists. The 
craze swept from Maine to Ohio. 

Adventists in 1843 did not sow the seed for the coming 
year. Why sow wheat if the end of the world is here? 
They kept their children out of school. On that eventful 
night the devotees of Miller put on their ascension robes 
and gazed into the heavens, waiting for the coming of the 
Lord, but midnight came and disappointment filled their 
hearts. Miller admitted the defeat, but became a "time- 
setter" again. He proclaimed that the second coming 
was 1844. He had erred in calculation, he told his fol- 
lowers. Another year they waited and watched, preached 
and sang. Their arguments were unanswerable. They 
knew they were right. With chart and Bible they went 
forth to convince the unbeliever and encourage the saint. 
But Miller met one opponent that put him to flight. Old 
remorseless Time marched past 1844 an< 3 demolished the 
follies of Adventism. 

Two humiliating defeats should have made him cau- 
tious, but again he prophesied that 1845 would be the 
time for the second coming. This was too much for his 
deluded followers, and Millerism went to pieces. Out of 
the fragments Seventh-Day Adventism was constructed. 



SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 23 

Mrs. Ellen G. White became the prophetess. She was 
born in Maine, 1827. In 1840 she heard Miller lecture 
on Adventism. She became a time-setter and went forth 
to prepare the people for the coming of the Lord. She set 
the time for 1843, ^44 and 1845. 

She began to have dreams, hear voices, see angels and 
visions. Healing by prayer became a part of her teach- 
ing. She tells us that she saw Mrs. Curtis command a 
Mrs. Howland, who was very ill with the fever, to arise 
and be made whole. This command was given in the 
name of Jesus. Healing now became a part of her work. 
In 1846 she for the first time heard Elder Bates urge the 
people to keep the seventh day, the Sabbath. To this time 
she, with all the Millerites, kept the first day, or Sunday. 
She tells us she did not deem it of much importance then. 

But shortly she had a divine revelation. She saw a 
wonderful light. "If this is not the Spirit of God, wtiat 
is it ? I don't know ; therefore it is the Spirit of God." 
She says : ''Jesus lifted the covering of the Ark, and to 
my amazement I saw the Fourth Commandment in the 
center of the ten, with a halo of light encircling it. I was 
shown by the angel that the true Sabbath was Saturday, 
established at the foundation of the earth, and if we had 
kept it there would have been no idolatry." The Sabbath 
question from that time on became the burning question 
to her. Yet she admits she did not keep it right for ten 
years, although an angel gave her the vision. Adventists 
began for ten years at 6 p. m. instead of sunset. 

Three things characterize Adventism : Prophecy, the 
Sabbath, the Sleep of the Soul. 

1. As to Prophecy. — Adventists have prophesied that 
the end of time would be 1843, '44> '45> ^o, '57, 1863, 
1877, 1896, and on till we are dizzy counting. If there 
ever was a movement that has been a failure and a delu- 
sion, it is Millerism. Mrs. White has done no better. 
She preached the midnight cry of 1843-44, and taught 



24 SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 

Christ's coming would be 1845. Here are some of her 
foolish prophecies : 

(a) Christ would come in 1844. 

(b) She said in 1856: "Many who are here will live 
to see the Lord come.'' A false prophecy. 

(c) As a prophetess she declared the salvation for sin- 
ners ended in 1844. Now she pleads for sinners to come 
to Christ. False again. 

(d) She tells us, 1849, tnat when Jesus comes the 
slaves would break their chains. Jesus has not come and 
slavery is dead. 

(e) In 1862 she said: "This war cannot be settled 
successfully." It was. Another failure. 

(/) In 1862, when our nation was under the storm 
and stress of life, this divine prophetess had a revelation 
about dress reform. "God would now have His people to 
put on the reform dress." This dress should be nine 
inches above the shoe. It was this revelation that caused 
many of the women to put on the old-time Bloomer. 
When Mrs. White began to teach this folly many of the 
sisters cried, some argued, a few rebelled, but most sub- 
mitted. Sons and husbands would not go on the street 
with this bloomer. Mrs. White wore this indecent and 
ridiculous dress, but now she and all of the sisters have 
abandoned the silly reform. What was a divine revela- 
tion in 1862 has no binding force now. Mrs. White is liv- 
ing in rebellion against her own revelation. She has 
eleven volumes of what she and her dupes call divine 
revelations. In the later volumes of her testimonies many 
of her revelations are omitted, for time had made them 
false prophecies. Dr. Canright, who knows all about Ad- 
ventism, for he was one of their champions for years, 
says : "In 1885 ner testimonies were published under the 
eyes of her son. I found an average of twenty-four 
changes of the words on each page. At the same rate, 
there would be 73,720 changes in her revelations." Jesus 



SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 25 

never had to change one word of his teachings. Mrs. 
White is a false prophetess. 

2. The Sabbath. — The second great distinguishing 
feature of the Adventists is their teachings concerning the 
Sabbath. They claim the Sabbath, the seventh day, Sat- 
urday, should be kept as a holy day. They have not 
learned that the Ten Commandments and Penalties were 
Jewish state laws, and that no one was commanded to 
keep them as such except the people living in a little strip 
of country about 140 miles long and 50 miles broad. It 
was the Jewish nation, and that nation only, that could 
legally put a man to death for lying. The whole army of 
foolish declaimers, from Ingersoll to Mrs. White, has 
never realized that men were put to death for stealing by 
the authority of the Jewish state. 

THE SABBATH, AND THE LORD'S DAY. 

Before discussing the Sabbath question directly, let me preface 
it with a few words upon "Rightly dividing the words of truth." 

Paul admonished Timothy to rightly divide the word of 
truth. This is an important subject to-day. Nearly all the relig- 
ious delusions, Adventism, Mormonism, Faith Cure and Chris- 
tian Science, live because the Bible is not properly divided. 
Preachers seem not to see the difference between the law and the 
Gospel, and the authority of Moses and the authority of Jesus, 
the binding force of the Old Covenant and the New. 

We often hear people say : "We think the whole Bible is 
binding upon us now." They do not believe what they say. They 
do not try to keep the following commands : 

1. God commanded every male child to be circumcised. Gen. 
17:10-14. Do they circumcise their children? 

2. God commanded the offering of sacrifices. Lev. 23:19-20. 

3. God commanded the lands to rest every seven years. Ex. 
23:10-11. 

4. God commanded three feasts each year. Ex. 23:14-15. 

5. God said not to eat swine. Lev. 11 :7-8. 

6. Do you wash one another's feet? Read John 13. 

7. The holy kiss was enjoined. Do brothers kiss? 

These laws were partly Jewish, partly custom, and not binding. 

There are three dispensations in the Bible: The Patriarchal, 
Jewish and Christian. Under the Patriarchal, we have the fam- 
ily; under the Jewish, the state; under the Christian, the church. 
Under the Jewish, we have the law; under the Christian, the 
Gospel. What is true of one is not necessarily true of the other. 
That which would bless a Patriarch would condemn a Jew. 



26 SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 

That which was a righteous act for a Jew would be a sin for a 
Christian. 

The Patriarch builded his own altar and offered his own sac- 
rifice. But a Jew must let the priest offer the sacrifice. It would 
be wrong for him to offer it only through the priest. 

It would be a sin for a Christian to offer a bloody sacrifice. 

Some people say: "Can I not be saved like the thief on the 
cross ?" 

_ Certainly not. Jesus had not sealed his will when the thief 
cried for mercy. Jesus was yet on earth, and had a right to dis- 
pose of His property as He pleased. All was His. He could say 
to the woman, "Thy sins be forgiven thee." 

But when His will was sealed, the testator dead and the ex- 
ecutors made known, the terms of the will, the only way to get 
the blessings of the will is to comply with its conditions. We 
no longer go back to the old will or covenant made with the 
Jews, but to the covenant made by Jesus. The old covenant has 
been made a dead will by the new will. Some people must blend 
covenants in order to get seventh-day Sabbath, infant member- 
ship, and infant baptism. 

But the entire old covenant, Ten Commandments and all, gave 
way to the law of Christ. 

The Jewish law was given to govern the Jews in their child- 
hood period. The Gospel is higher law and supersedes the law. 
The Gospel is perfect. The Ten Commandments were defective. 
They did not condemn drunkenness, enjoin love or urge charity. 
Not one word of love in them. A man could lie in his bed seven 
days in the week, and be drunk all the time, and not violate the 
Ten Commandments. 

A man may keep the Ten Commandments perfectly and be 
lost. 

THE SABBATH ESTABLISHED. 

The first mention of the Sabbath is Ex. 16:23. The race had 
then marched 2,500 years across the centuries. There is no evi- 
dence at all that any one ever kept the Sabbath prior to this time. 

Sabbatarians tell us that it was established at creation. Gen. 
2:1-3. 

It is important to notice that there is no mention of the Sab- 
bath here. Gen. 3 :20 says Adam called his wife Eve because she 
was the mother of all the living. Yet she, at the time Adam 
spoke, was the mother of no one. Moses looking backward 2,500 
years said Eve was the mother of all the living. If the mention 
of the seventh day had anything whatever to do with the Sab- 
bath, Moses was simply taking a retrospective view. 

The Sabbath was the seventh day of the week, or Saturday. 

"8. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 

"9. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work : 

"10. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God : 
in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy 



SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 27 

daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, 
nor thy stranger that is within thy gates : 

"11. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the 
sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day : where- 
fore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex. 20. 

No work was to be done on the Sabbath. Ex. 20:10. 

"13. Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, 
Verily my Sabbaths ye shall keep : for it is a sign between me 
and you throughout your generations ; that ye may know that I 
am the Lord that doth sanctify you. 

"14. Ye shall keep the Sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto 
you. Every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death : for 
whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from 
among his people. 

15. "Six days may work be done ; but in the seventh is the 
Sabath of rest, holy to the Lord : whosoever doeth any work in 
the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. 

"16. Wherefore the Children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, 
to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a per- 
petual covenant. 

"17. It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for 
ever : for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the 
seventh day He rested and was refreshed." Exodus 31. 

The penalty of violation was death. 

"2. Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day there 
shall be to you a holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the Lord: who- 
soever doeth work therein shall be put to death. 

"3. Ye shall kindle no fire throughout your habitations upon 
the Sabbath day." Ex. 35. 

To pick up sticks or build a fire was a violation. 

"32. 'And while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, 
they found a man that gathered sticks upon the Sabbath day. 

"33. And they that found him gathering sticks brought him 
unto Moses and Aaron, and unto all the congregation. 

"34. And they put him in ward, because it was not declared 
what should be done to him. 

"35. And the Lord said unto Moses, The man shall be surely 
put to death : all the congregation shall stone him with stones 
without the camp. 

"36. And all the congregation brought him without the Cdtnp, 
and stoned him with stones, and he died; as the Lord commanded 
Moses." Numbers 15. 

The old covenant was the Ten Commandments. 

"12. And the Lord spake unto you out of the midst of the 
fire : ye heard the voice of the words, but saw no similitude ; only 
ye heard a voice. 

"13. And he declared unto you his covenant, which he com- 



28 SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 

manded you to perform, even ten commandments ; and he wrote 
them upon two tables of stone." Deut. 4. 

"9. When I was gone up into the mount to receive the tables 
of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the Lord made 
with you, then I abode in the mount forty days and forty nights ; 
I neither did eat bread nor drink water." Deut. 9. 

"27. And the Lord said unto Moses, Write thou these words : 
for after the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with 
thee and with Israel. 

"28. And he was there with the Lord forty days and forty 
nights ; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote 
upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten command- 
ments." Bx. 34. 

All other laws were enactments under this covenant, which 
was the supreme law of the land. 

This old covenant was to be replaced by a new covenant. 

"31. Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make 
a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of 
Judah : 

"32. ' Not according to the covenant that I made with their 
fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them 
out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, al- 
though I was a husband unto them, saith the Lord : 

"33. But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the 
house of Israel ; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my 
law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will 
be their God, and they shall be my people. 

"34. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, 
and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for they 
shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of 
them, saith the Lord : for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will 
remember their sin no more." Jer. 31. 

The old covenant, the Ten Commandments, with all enact- 
ments, "the laws of Moses," was abrogated, hence as such have 
no binding force. 

"14. For sin shall not have dominion over you : for ye are 
not under the law, but under grace." Rom. 6. 

"4. Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the 
law by the body of Christ ; that ye should be married to another, 
even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring 
forth fruit unto God." Rom. 7. 

"24. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us 
unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. 

"25. But after that faith is come, we are no longer' under a 
schoolmaster." Gal. 3. 

"13. And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircum- 
cision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having 
forgiven you all trespasses; 

"14. Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was 



SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 29 

against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, 
nailing it to his cross ; 

"15. And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made 
a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it. 

"16. Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, 
or in respect of a holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath 
days : 

"17. Which are a shadow of things to come ; but the body is 
of Christ." Col 2. 

"Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of 
commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself 
of twain one new man, so making peace ; Bph. 2. 

"3. For as much as ye are manifestly declared to be the epis- 
tle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the 
spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshly tables 
of the heart. 

"4. And such trust have we through Christ to Godward : 

"5. Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything 
as of ourselves ; but our sufficiency is of God ; 

"6. Who also hath made us able ministers of the New Testa- 
ment ; not of the letter, but of the spirit; for the letter killeth, 
but the spirit giveth life. 

"7. But if the ministrations of death, written and engraven 
in stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not 
steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his coun- 
tenance ; which glory was to be done away ; 

"8. How shall not the ministrations of the spirit be rather 
glorious? 

"9. For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much 
more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory. 

"10. For even that which was made glorious had no glory in 
this respect, by reason of the glory that excelleth. 

"11. For if that which is done away was glorious, much more 
that which remaineth is glorious. 

"12. Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plain- 
ness of speech : 

"13. And not as Moses, which put a veil over his face, that 
the children of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that 
which is abolished : 

"14. But their minds were blinded : for until this day remain- 
eth the same veil untaken away in the reading of the Old Testa- 
ment; which veil is done away in Christ. II Cor. 3. 

"6. But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by 
how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was 
established upon better promises. 

"7. For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should 
no place have been sought for the second. 

"8. For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days 
come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the 
house of Israel and with the house of Judah : 



3 o SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 

"9. Not according to the covenant that I made with their 
fathers, in the day when I took them by the hand and lead them 
out of the land of Egypt ; because they continued not in my cove- 
nant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. 

10. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house 
of Israel after those days, saith the Lord ; I will put my laws into 
their mind, and write them in their hearts ; and I will be to them 
a God, and they shall be to me a people: 

"11. And they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and 
every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord : for all shall know 
me, from the least to the greatest. 

"12. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and 
their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. 

"15. In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first 
old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish 
away." Heb. 8. 

The Sabbath was given to the Jew only, and was a sign be- 
tween the Lord and Israel. 

"2. The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. 
t "3. The Lord made not this covenant with out fathers, but 
with us, even us, who are all of here alive this day." Deut. 5. 

See Ex. 34 127-28. 

"29. See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath, there- 
fore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days : abide 
ye every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the 
seventh day." Bx. 16. 

See Ex. 31 :iy. 

"9. Tltere was nothing in the ark save the two tables of 
stone, which Moses put there at Horeb, when the Lord made a 
covenant, with the children of Israel, when they came out of the 
land of Egypt. 

"21. And I have set there a place for the ark, wherein is 
the covenant of the Lord, which he made with our fathers, when 
he brought them out of the land of Egypt." 1 Kings 8. 

Our Sabbatarians try to make an argument out of the expres- 
sions, "perpetual Sabbath," "you shall keep it forever," etc. They 
tell us that this means that the Sabbath will always be binding. 
But this line of argument would perpetuate the whole Jewish 
law. 

The law says : "Ye shall keep a feast to the Lord, forever." 
Do we keep the feasts? 

The Jews were told to keep "A perpetual incense before the 
Lord." All these laws were perpetuated as long as the Jewish 
Dispensation continued, no longer. The slave was to serve his 
master forever, that is as long as he lived. The Advents tell us 
that if the Jewish law is annulled, and the Ten Commandments 
are done away, that it is not a sin to steal. It was wrong to steal 
before the Ten Commandments were given. It would be wrong 
to steal if the Ten Commandments had never been given. The 
giving of the law to Moses simply made the commands civil laws 



SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 



3i 



with penalties. Moses made adultery a crime. Jesus makes it a 
sin that will damn the soul. To our objectors let us say plainly: 
There is not one single command binding that is not found in the 
New Testament. Everything that is necessary for me to do in 
order to become a Christian and everything that I should do to 
get to heaven is clearly taught in the New Testament. My whole 
duty to God and man is found in the teaching of Jesus and the 
Apostles. Christ, not Moses, is our teacher. All the Ten Com- 
mandments save one are re-enacted in the new covenant from 
fifty times to three times, and are therefore binding. Reverence 
for God is enjoined fifty times, the condemnation of adultery 
twelve times, and idolatry three times. We place them here side 
by side. 



THE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF 
THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



THE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF 
THE NEW TESTAMENT. 



"1. Thou shalt have no other 
Gods before me." Ex. 20:3. 



"1. We preach unto you that 
ye should turn from these vani- 
ties unto the living God, which 
made heaven and earth and the 
sea." Acts Td:i$. 



2. Thou shalt not make unto 
thee any graven image ; * * * 
thou shalt not bow down to 
them nor serve them." Ex. 
10:4-5. 



"2. Little children keep your- 
selves from idols. John 5:21. 



"3. Thou shalt not take the 
name of the Lord thy God in 
vain." Ex. 20:7. 



"4. Remember the Sabbath 
day to keep it holy. Ex. 20:8. 



"3. But above all things, my 
brethren, swear not, neither by 
heaven, neither by the earth, 
neither by any other oath." 
James 5:12. 

4. There is no command in 
all the New Testament to keep 
the seventh day after the resur- 
rection. 



"5. Honor thy father and thy 
mother." Ex. 20:12 



"5. Children, obey your par- 
ents in the Lord, for this is 
right." Eph. 6:1. 



"6. Thou shalt not kill." Ex. 
20:13. 

"7. Thou shalt not commit 
adultery." Ex. 20:14. 



"6. Thou shalt not kill." 
Rom. 13:9. 

"7. Neither fornicators nor 
idolators nor adulterers * * * 
shall inherit the kingdom of 
God." 1 Cor. 6:9-10. 



32 SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 

"8. Thou shalt not steal." "8. Steal no more." Bph. 

Ex. 20:15. 4:28. 

"9. Thou shalt not bear false "Lie not." Col. 3:0. 

witness." Ex. 20:16. 

"10. Thou shalt not covet." "10. Covetousness, let it not 

Ex. 20:17. be named among you." Eph. 

Authority for the new covenant* 

"And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power 
is given unto me in heaven and in earth." Math. 28:18. 

If all authority is given to Jesus, Moses has no authority. He 
gave the Apostles authority to make law. 

"19. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of 
heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in 
heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed 
in heaven." Math. 16. 

"23. Whosoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; 
and whosoever sins ye retain, they are retained." John 20. 

Any command given by the Apostles is therefore from Christ, 
and binding. 

REASONS FOR THE) LORD'S DAY. 

"i. In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward 
the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other 
Mary to see the sepulchre." Math. 28. 

"1. Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the 
morning, they came to the sepulchre, bringing the spices which 
they had prepared, and certain others with them." Luke 24. 

"25. Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as 
the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much 
the more, as ye see the day approaching." Heb. 10. 

"1. Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have 
given order to the churches of Gallatia, even so do ye. 

"2. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay 
by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be 
no gatherings when I come." 1 Cor. 16. 

"7. And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples 
came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to 
depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until mid- 
night." Acts. 20. 

In Acts 2:1-5 we find that the Holy Spirit fell upon the 
Apostles, and the Christian Church was organized. Therefore, 
the following events took place on the first day of the week: 

1. Jesus arose from the dead. 

2. The descent of the Holy Spirit. 

3. The establishment of the church. 

4. The disciples met to break bread. 

5. The early Christians met to take the collection. 



SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 33 

With all these events crowded into the resurrection day, how 
could it become less than the great commemorative day of the 
church? 

This first day of the week is the Lord's day, not a Sabbath 
day. It is a day to be celebrated, not to be kept. A day of serv- 
ice, not a day of idleness. A day when we labor for the Lord, 
not for ourselves. Secular work should give place to 
sacred work. By common consent this day has been called the 
Lord's day. This is true in every period of the history of the 
church. 

1. In 747 A. D. an English council said : "It is ordered that 
the Lord's day be celebrated with due veneration." 

2. In 400 Augustine said : "The day known as the Lord's 
day is the first day of the week." 

3. Eusebius, the father of history, in 324 calls the first day 
of the week Lord's day. 

4. In 306, the Bishop of Alexandria wrote : "We celebrate 
the Lord's day as a day of joy for on it He arose." 

5. Cyprian, 250, says the first day of the week is the Lord's 
day. 

6. Justin Martyr, 140, says : "Sunday is the day on which 
we hold our common assembly — the day on which Jesus arose 
from the dead." 

7. John, 96, while on the isle of Patmos, said : "I was in the 
spirit on the Lord's day." Rev. 1:10. 

Take notice. In all history the Lord's day never refers to the 
seventh day or Sabbath. The Bible, no divine writer, nor any 
writer, for the first three centuries, ever applied the word Sab- 
bath to Sunday or first day. The Sabbath was and is Saturday 
or seventh day. To talk about a Sabbath service on Sunday is as 
contradictory as to speak of holding a Wednesday prayer-meet- 
ing on Thursday. They are two distinct days. It is false to 
say that the Catholics changed the day ; that Constantine made 
a law changing the Sabbath to the first day. Constantine simply 
made a state law, as all states have now, demanding the cessa- 
tion of secular work on Sunday ; nothing more. The Lord's day 
was the common name for the first day of the week, before Con- 
stantine was born. A Sunday-school is not a Sabbath-school. 
The Lord's day is a sacred day. We should celebrate it as a 
day of joy. Do not spend it either in idleness, business or so- 
cial calling. Give it to the Lord's service. A boy saw seven 
sweet pears on a tree, and said to the farmer : "Can I have one 
of those pears?" The good farmer gave him six of the seven. 
The boy ran away without even a "thank you," and ate the six 
pears; then slipped back into the yard and stole the last pear. 
He was a mean boy, and no meaner than the Christian who 
steals the Lord's day by visiting and pleasure-seeking. 

Col. 2:3-17 tells us that the Sabbath was nailed to the cross. 
When a Roman law was repealed, they ran a nail through it, 
hence it was a dead law, just as when a conductor pjunches a 
ticket, it is valueless. The Advents say the word Sabbath does 



34 SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 

not refer to the seventh day, but to feasts. Sabbat on is the form 
used in Col. n :i6. The fourth commandment says: "Keep the 
Sabbath," and uses the same form." See Deut. 5:12. 

Acts 13:14 says: "Went into the Synagogue on the Sabbath 
day." Here the same form Sabbaton is used. This form, geni- 
tive plural, is often used for the seventh day, the Sabbath. The 
word Sabbath occurs sixty times in the new Testament. All 
admit that fifty-nine times reference is made to the Sabbath. It 
is foolish to make the exception in this one case. 

That the Sabbath and the Ten Commandments, as a code of 
laws are not binding upon us is the common verdict of the 
Bible scholars of all ages. Hear them : 

1. Justin Martyr : "The law made on Horeb is old and be- 
longs to the Jews. The Ten Commandments are abrogated." 
A. D. 140. 

2. Tertullian, 200 A. D. "The Ten Commandments do not 
apply to Christians but to Jews." 

3. Eusebius, 324. "We do not observe the Sabbath because 
such things do not belong to Christians. We meet on the Lord's 
day ; not the Sabbath." 

The first day of the week — Sunday — is never called Sabbath 
by any divine writer, nor by any writer in the early part of the 
Christian era. Sunday is not a Sabbath. It is the Lord's day. 

4. John Bunyan: "The old Sabbath is done away. The 
Sabbath has gone to the grave with the Old Testament." 

5. John Milton : "The Sabbath was given to those whom 
God brought out of Egypt, and does not refer to Christians." 

6. Martin Luther: "The Ten Commandments do not apply 
to Christians but only to Jews. In the New Testament Moses 
comes to an end and his laws lose their force." 

7. Philip Schaff, the greatest of Presbyterians, says : "The 
Jewish Christians ceased to observe the Sabbath after the de- 
struction of Jerusalem." 

8. Dr. Lee, a Methodist, says, in referring to Col. 2: "The 
Apostle refers to the seventh day Sabbath, and gives us to under- 
stand we are not bound to observe it." 

9. Chancellor Everest, of Illinois University : "The Chris- 
tian Church of the early centuries had no Sabbath. They com- 
memorated the Lord's day." 

10. Dr. Gill, a Baptist scholar of eminence, says : "The 
decalogue (Ten Commandments) is done away." Dr. Dobbs, 
another Baptist, quotes Gill as correct. 

11. Calvin taught the same. 

12. Dr. Lorimer, the greatest among Baptists, stated that 
we were not under the Jewish Code. 

13. Prof. M. D. Canright, an ordained Baptist preacher, says : 
"The abolition of the Sinaic Covenant carries with it the abo- 
lition of the Sabbath, so that there is no trace of it this side 
of the grave of our Lord." Again he says : "The Ten Com- 
mandments and the whole Jewish law are abolished, and the 



SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISM. 35 

Sabbath is not binding upon Christians." Again he says : "The 
following devout men held that the Ten Commandments were 
abolished: Luther, Calvin, Milton, Baxter, Bunyan, Doddridge, 
Watts, Judson and Locke." Add to these Martyr, Tertullian, 
Schaff, Beecher, Campbell and Dr. Gill; and we have good com- 
pany when we affirm that we are not under the Ten Command- 
ments, but under Christ. 

In the New Testament the duty to keep the Sabbath is never 
mentioned. The Apostles wrote twenty-one letters. Many of 
these letters were written to Gentiles who knew not the law. 
They never told any one to keep the Sabbath. They mention the 
Sababth but once, and that was to show that it was done away, 
nailed to the cross. We commemorate the first day of the week 
as an expression of love. Love is the fulfillment of the law. If 
we were commanded to celebrate the Lord's day, the beauty and 
sweetness of the day would be destroyed. We do not need a 
command to celebrate the Fourth of July. It represents the 
birthday of the nation. If your father were to command you to 
celebrate his birthday, there could be no joy in complying with 
the command. If we love the Lord we will celebrate his resur- 
rection day. 



CHAPTER V. 

MORMONISM. 

To write a correct account of the movement started by 
Joseph Smith is no easy task. The historic facts are 
difficult to obtain. In our encyclopedias Catholics write 
Catholic history, Protestants discuss Protestantism, and 
Spiritualists furnish the articles on Spiritualism, while 
the enemies of Smith write his life and history. Much 
that was written was written under the white heat of ex- 
citement and is not reliable. Books are full of the false 
claims made by both the Saints and their opponents. We 
gain nothing by misrepresentation. Notice a few of the 
common mistakes of writers upon this subject : 

THE THREE WITNESSES, COWDERLY, HARRIS AND 
WHITMER. 

It is not unusual to assert that these three witnesses turned 
against all that they had taught, denounced the teaching of 
Smith, and repudiated the Book of Mormon. Some have 
gone so far as to declare that all three of them, Oliver Cowderly, 
David Whitmer and Martin Harris lived wicked lives and died 
outcasts. John H. Smith of the Utah church said in open court : 
"Oliver Cowderly, Martin Harris and David Whitmer aposta- 
tized." 

A book recently published by Revell, with E. E. Folk, of 
Nashville, as author, makes these charges and defends the old 
exploded theory of the Spaulding manuscript. This book the 
Mormon Monster is full of misrepresentations. Truth is always 
better than error. These three witnesses did denounce Mormon- 
ism as it is in Utah. But not one of them rejected the Book of 
Mormon. They never connected themselves with any division 
of the Latter Day Saints after they were driven out of Missouri. 
They died out of the church, but all claimed that the Book of 
Mormon was divine. Cowderly left the church during the Miss- 
ouri troubles. He practiced law in Elkhorn, Wis., and died in 
Richmond, Mo., in 1850. Martin Harris left Missouri and re- 
turned to Ohio. He died in Utah in 1875. He left the church 
in Missouri and never returned to its fellowship. He claimed 
to the last that his testimony concerning the revelation to Joseph 
Smith was true. In 1887 David Whitmer wrote a book, "An 
Address to All Believers." In this book he declares that he 



MORMONISM. 2,7 

was with Cowderly at his death, in 1850, and that he died be- 
lieving in the Book of Mormon. Whitmer tells us he left the 
Latter Day Saints in 1838. He tells why he left them. He then 
tells why he never united with the Mormons or the reorganized 
church. He reaffirms his faith in the Book of Mormon. The 
writer has talked with many persons, who knew Whitmer, in 
Missouri, and all testify that for forty years Whitmer lived a 
life above reproach. He died in Richmond, Mo., 1888, at the age 
of 83. 

In discussing this subject it will be necessary to make a 
clear distinction between the religious societies. 

1. The Mormon church of Utah believes that Joseph 
Smith was a divine prophet ; that the Book of Mormon is 
inspired ; that the Doctrines of the Covenant is a book of 
authority ; that all the revelations of Joseph Simth and 
Brigham Young are binding upon the church, and that 
Joseph Smith gave the revelation upon polygamy. They 
believe in blood atonement and defend celestial marriage. 

2. The Kedrickites believe that the Book of Mormon 
is true and that Smith was a divine prophet, but that after 
he abandoned the stone as a medium in revelation his 
prophecies were defective. This was the belief of David 
Whitmer. These people are few, located in and around 
Independence, Mo. 

3. The Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of the 
Latter Day Saints accept Smith as a prophet and the Book 
of Mormon and the Doctrine of the Covenant as inspired. 
They deny that Smith gave the revelation on polygamy, 
and declare it was a forgery by Brigham Young. They 
sent a committee to Washington to work for the anti- 
polygamy law. They have always been opposed to polyg- 
amy and blood atonement. They reject the name Mor- 
mon. 

TH£ HISTORY OF MORMONISM. 

Joseph Smith was born in Vermont, 1805. At ten years 
of age he moved with his parents to Palmyra, N. Y. In 
this vicinity he lived ten years. He was reared on a farm. 



38 MORMONISM. 

His father had been a water witch. Joseph continued to 
hunt for water and to dig wells. He advanced and began 
to divine where to find lost articles and stolen goods. 
When about fourteen he became anxious about the future. 
He found no comfort in the teachings of the denomina- 
tions. In 1820, while alone in meditation and prayer, a 
bright light came upon him and he saw two angels. One 
called him by name and told him not to go after any of 
the denominations, for they were- all wrong. Three years 
after this vision, one night in his bed (1823) a light like 
that of the day filled his room. The messenger pro- 
claimed himself to be an angel of God. The angel in- 
formed him that he was to be an instrument in the hands 
of God in bringing about His purpose. This angel told 
him about the hidden plates. He was permitted to go to 
the hill Cumorah and behold the plates. In 1827, four 
years after the second appearance, the angel Moroni de- 
livered the plates to him. Joseph Smith is the only wic- 
ness to these wonderful visions. Upon the evidence of 
this one illiterate man the Mormon hierarchy is founded. 

the vision. 

He went out alone to meditate and pray. He was look- 
ing for a vision. The mind can see what it is looking for. 
He lost sight, he tells us, of all surrounding objects. He 
was in the subjective state, the condition of the medium 
or the hypnotized person. The medium sees the spirits 
of the dead, the insane man sees his dead mother, and 
Joseph saw an angel. While in an epileptic fit Moham- 
med saw an angel, and the Book of Koran was given. 
Smith saw an angel, and we have the Book of Mormon. 
The Mohammedans reject the vision^ of the Greeks, the 
Christians of the Middle Ages repudiate the Moslem 
vision, the Mormon rejects the vision of the witches, and 
sensible people reject all of them. The vision of Joseph 
Smith was either a fraud or a delusion, yet upon these 
vagaries the Latter Day Saints build their religion. 



MORMONISM. 39 

CONDITIONS FAVORABLE FOR DELUSIONS. 

The surrounding conditions prepare the way for de- 
lusions. Beginning about 1803 a wild religious craze 
swept over this country. In these exciting meetings peo- 
ple saw angels, heard voices, had visions, swooned and 
became unconscious. When they returned to conscious- 
ness they would tell their visions. People called that con- 
version. They were looking for angels and expecting to 
heir voices. In most cases the excitable and emotional 
found what was then foolishly called salvation. Now, if 
these people could have revelations and see visions, why 
not Joseph Smith? It was an easy transition. Religious 
fanaticism paved the way for the birth of Mormonism. 
There was another element that influenced the public 
mind. Antagonism among religious societies was rife. 
Sermons were in the form of debates. In this school Sid- 
ney Rigdon had been trained. He was a Baptist preacher, 
but had left the Baptists to try his powers among the Dis- 
ciples. He preached for an independent church after 
leaving the Disciples. In 1830 he appears among the 
Mormons. Dr. Lamb, a Baptist, wrote in 1901 : "A large 
majority of the first 2,000 converts to Mormonism came 
from the Baptists." Smith tells us that in 1827 the angel 
of the Lord delivered to him the plates from which he 
translated the Book of Mormon. 

With these plates a peculiar stone, Urim and Thum- 
mim, was found, by the aid of which Joseph was able to 
translate the records. The prophet left New York and 
located at Harmony, Pa. Here he became associated with 
Martin Harris. From these golden plates Smith and 
Harris began the translation. 

The plates were seven inches broad and eight inches 
long, each plate as thick as tin, the volume about six 
inches thick. According to some witnesses they weighed 
sixty pounds. 

These plates were deposited 1,400 years ago, about 350 



40 MORMONISM. 

A. D., by Moroni, son of Mormon. The history of Amer- 
ica's ancient people was found on these plates. 

According to the Book of Mormon, after the confusion 
of tongues at the Tower of Babel, one Jared and his 
brother, with their families, builded barges and sailed to 
America. They became a mighty people. They warred 
among themselves, and finally at Cumorah they were all 
annihilated. Ether, the prophet, kept a record of these 
events. This destruction took place about 600 B. C. 
About the same time America was again peopled. These 
people left the old world 600 B. C, during the reign of 
Zedekiah. They embarked on the Red Sea and landed on 
the western coast of South America. Lehi was the 
leader, and when he died his son Nephi succeeded him. 
His brothers, Laman and Lemuel, set up a rival kingdom. 
War drove the Nephites northward, pursued by the La- 
manites, upon whom a curse had been placed, the swarthy 
skin. The Nephites, the whites, met in battle the Laman- 
ites, the Indians, at Cumorah. On this same ground ten 
centuries before the Jaredites were destroyed. In this 
battle the Nephites were completely destroyd. 

The records of these wars were kept by Moroni, the son 
of Mormon. Before he died he hid these records in the 
hill Cumorah. 

The angel Moroni showed Smith the plates from which 
the Book of Mormon was written. 

The Lamanites are the American Indians. 

This is the history as the Mormons give it to the world. 
This we are asked to accept, though no evidence, save a 
few interested persons. 

Smith says he translated a few characters and sent them 
to Prof. Anthon, of New York. This evidence will be dis- 
cussed at another time. 

Smith and Harris continued the translation. Several 
pages were stolen from the home of Harris. This inter- 
fered with the work. 

In 1829, April 5th, Smith and Cowderly met for the 



MORMONISM. 41 

first time. In two days they had gone into business, 
Smith as the translator and Cowderly as scribe. 

With the stone Smith looked into his hat, and, as he 
claims, God gave him the power to translate these re- 
formed Egyptian characters. 

May 15th Smith and Cowderly claim they were or- 
dained to the priesthood by John the Baptist. At this 
time they baptized each other. In June of this year, 1829, 
Smith moved to Fayette, N. Y., the home of Peter Whit- 
mer, the father of David. With Cowderly as assistant, 
Smith continued the translation until it was completed. 

The first church was organized at Fayette, N. Y., April 
6th, 1830. At this time the church was called the Church 
of Christ, but was changed to the Latter Day Saints. The 
first organization contained six members, half of them 
Smiths. 

The first edition of the Book of Mormon contained this 
same date. In 1831 Joseph Smith moved to Kirtland, 
Ohio, and the Saints began to gather at this place, which 
now became their headquarters. 

Here David Whitmer was set apart as the historian of 
the church. The church now numbered 2,000. Smith 
went to Missouri and the Lord revealed to him the loca- 
tion for the New Jerusalem, the spot upon which the tem- 
ple is to be built. This temple lot is in Independence, Mo. 

In conference at Kirtland, Ohio, the church was named 
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It was 
during this year that an exodus from Ohio to Missouri 
took place. In 1837 tne Kirtland Bank, managed by 
Smith and Rigdon, failed and created quite a scandal. 
Joseph had a revelation to depart from the land to Mis- 
souri. They obeyed the revelation and left the land be- 
tween two days, pursued by their angry creditors. In a 
short time Rigdon preached a defiant sermon, in which he 
threatened the Gentiles and declared that the Saints were 
above law. Trouble began. 

Not all the Saints were willing to accept all the revela- 



42 MORMONISM. 

tions of Smith. Every desire was followed by a revela- 
tion. Oliver Cowderly and David Whitmer, two of the 
three witnesses, were cut off from the Latter Day Saints. 
Neither ever united with the Saints again. Both of them 
declared Smith's later revelations fraudulent. The Danite 
band was organized. That this band did exist David 
Whitmer and many others admit. The spirit of rebellion 
pervaded every community of the Mormons. Smith de- 
clared that Saints were independent of all earthly rules. 
Skirmishings and war began. Governor Boggs ordered 
the Mormons to leave Missouri. Brigham Young fled for 
his life to Quincy, 111. The leaders were arrested and put 
in jail, while the great army of Mormons left the State. 
Smith and other leaders escaped from the authorities and 
with about 12,000 Mormons left for Illinois. They ar- 
rived at Nauvoo, 111., in 1839. They soon began grasping 
for power. Nauvoo was incorporated and all officers 
were Mormons. Smith was elected General of the Nau- 
voo Legion and Mayor of the city. He soon began to 
meddle in politics and intrigue with politicians. His word 
was law and his poor dupes would vote as he dictated. 
He had divine revelation for his people to vote the Demo- 
cratic ticket after pledging his support to the Whigs. 
Again the Lord told him to vote for the Whigs. Puffed 
up in his authority, he became a dictator. 

Mormons openly denounced the government. When 
he was arrested the City Council released him. If not in 
Nauvoo, the Nauvoo Legion came to his rescue. His 
revelations began to take a political turn as well as a busi- 
ness aspect. These revelations told his people how to 
vote, to build hotels and many other things. To crown 
the whole folly of Mormonism, in 1844 Smith announced 
himself a candidate for the Presidency. 

a William Law and several others opposed these usurpa- 
tions. They printed one issue of their paper. By order 
of the prophet the press was demolished. Law and his co- 
workers fled to Carthage. Governor Ford declared that 



MORMONISM. 43 

the Mormons had set up a government within a govern- 
ment. The prophet pledged his support to one candidate. 
This meant 3,500 votes and would surely elect the candi- 
date. Two days before election Hyrum Smith, Joseph's 
brother, had a revelation that God would have the people 
vote for one Hodge and not for Walker, to whom the 
prophet had pledged support. 

A day before the election the prophet said in assembly : 
"I promised Mr. Walker I would vote for him. I will do 
it. You can vote for Walker, Hodge or the devil. I have 
not consulted the Lord. Hyrum has." Hyrum said : 
"The Lord would have you vote for Hodge." Walker 
got one vote, Hodge 3,000. Hyrum made the greatest 
stump speech on record. Intense excitement prevailed. 
The prophet was accused of many crimes. He began to 
play tyrant. He established an office, contrary to law, 
where all titles to land must be recorded. Smith estab- 
lished an office for the issuing of marriage licenses to 
Mormons. William Law accused Smith of improper re- 
lations toward his wife, attempting to take her as his 
spiritual wife. Wlien the sheriff was sent to arrest him 
and others for riot, the Legion was called out to protect 
them. Nauvoo was placed under martial law by Smith. 
The Governor then ordered the State troops to Nauvoo. 
The prophet and his brother were cast into the Carthage 
jail and on the 27th day of June, 1844, Joseph and Hyrum 
were killed by a mob. Thus perished Joseph Smith. His 
death is to be deplored. To the Mormons he was a mar- 
tyr. To the world he was one of the most wonderful and 
successful impostors since Mohammed. When he died 
in all parts of the world there were perhaps 200,000 Mor- 
mons. Hon. J. H. Beadley, who spent years in Utah, 
says: "At the death of Joseph Smith he had not less 
than 200,000 followers. The Mormon church up to this 
date (1870) has not passed that number." Smith's love 
for power, greed for wealth, thirst for notoriety, and in- 
trigue and deception in politics destroyed him. 



44 MORMONISM. 

Impostors have flourished in all ages. They come to 
us wearing the mask of superstition. Again they wear 
the garb of humility. Now the impostor comes as a wild 
fanatic. There are political and social frauds, but the 
most deadly of all impostors is the religious impostor. 
He comes to us with his deformities and falsehoods cov- 
ered with the mantle of righteousness. The killing of 
Smith was a crime and a blunder. At that time his com- 
mercial system was going to pieces. His religious system 
was tottering. Hundreds were apostatizing. In the Mor- 
mon church some of the strongest and best men were pro- 
testing against the prophet's usurpations. 

Papers were started to expose some of the vile lives of 
men in the church. The hollowness of the whole system 
was apparent to all. 

While living he was spurned by many. When dead he 
became to all Mormons a martyr and prophet. Before his 
death the church was like a volcano charged ready to 
burst forth at any moment and carry death and destruc- 
tion to all. After his death the Mormons cried for re- 
venge and justice. For a while sympathy went with 
them. 

the successor. 

At the death of Smith the great question that the Saints 
must face was, ''Who shall succeed Joseph ?" True, the 
prophet had laid hands upon his eldest son, Joseph, and 
ordained him to rule in his stead. This, years before, he 
had done to David Whitmer. Others claimed that the 
unborn son of Emma Smith (born November 17, 1844) 
should succeed to the Presidency. Many Mormons claim 
that the son, David Hyrum, is to bring them back to the 
land of promise, Independence, Mo. 

But they must have an immediate leader. Warring 
factions began to clamor for eminence. 

Sidney Rigdon returned from the East and asserted his 



MORMONISM. 45 

claim. William, the prophet's brother, claimed the right 
to succeed him. 

Revelations now came rapidly. Rigdon had a revela- 
tion that he was to succeed Smith. Lyman Wright had a 
revelation to carry the Saints to Texas. James Strang 
had a revelation to lead them to Wisconsin. The Hed- 
rickites demanded recognition. Sidney Rigdon had taken 
offense because Smith had made improper proposals to 
his daughter Nancy. He hastened from Pittsburg and 
called a convention and claimed his right to rule. Brig- 
ham Young, then president of the twelve Apostles, op- 
posed Rigdon and cut him off from the church. About 
one hundred prominent Saints voted for Rigdon. 

Poor Rigdon ! What a career ! A Baptist preacher, a 
preacher in the ranks of the Disciples, an independent, a 
Mormon, a Saint, and finally an apostate. He went East, 
lived in seclusion and died a disappointed man. 

The assembly voted that the government should be in 
the College of the Twelve. Brigham Young was presi- 
dent and really became the ruler of the church. Troubles 
and disturbances increased. Mormons were called from 
all parts of the world to Nauvoo. They came in great 
numbers, 15,000 in all. The community around was un- 
der their authority. Justice in Nauvoo was impossible. 
All authority was in the hands of Young. The non-Mor- 
mons looked with suspicion upon these movements. The 
Mormons quit preaching and began to harangue the peo- 
ple, denouncing the government, the State and threaten- 
ing the non-Mormon citizens. Friction between the State 
authorities and Mormon authority became intense. 
Finally the Mormons agreed to leave the State. By May, 
1846, 16,000 had crossed the Mississippi River, turned 
toward the West. The Mormons broke up into factions. 
The better element went with Rigdon to Pennsylvania. 
Some followed W r right to Texas, others went north with 
Strang, many lingered in and around Independence, Mo. 
Others had enough of Mormonism and went home. Out 



46 MORMONISM. 

of 200,000 only 16,000 went with Young into Utah. 
True, they continued to go from all parts of the world to 
Utah for years. The Mormons went to Utah to escape 
United States authority. Utah was then Mexican soil. 
But this hated government followed them. Before all of 
them had arrived the United States had taken the land 
from Mexico. Hereafter bv Mormon we mean the Saints 
of Utah. 

Out there on the frontier the Mormons became defiant 
and rebellious. They established a social system that was 
a disgrace to civilization and an outrage upon religion. 
The Turk in his harem could not vie with polygamy. The 
thug's cruelty was mercy compared with Utah's blood 
atonement and the Danite murderers. The treason of 
Aaron Burr and Benedict Arnold was innocent when 
compared to the lawlessness, the usurpations and mock 
justice of Utah. Oaths, law and the rights of others were 
spurned to enhance the influence of Mormonism. The 
spirit of Mormonism has always been the spirit of oppres- 
sion and rebellion. Smith and Rigdon fled from Kirtland 
on account of dishonesty. In Missouri they were con- 
stantly in conflict with authority. In Nauvoo, state and 
national law was spurned. Arrogancy and tyranny took 
the place of loyalty. 

Before leaving Nauvoo social scandals were rife. This 
system in Utah bloomed into celestial marriage. Here 
for twenty years the Mormon monster had its own way. 
They defied the government, resisted the United States 
army, expelled the Gentile and murdered the emigrant. 
The whole system was a reservoir of sin, misery and 
wickedness from which flowed streams of ruin and de- 
struction. Vows, fidelity and love gave way to treachery, 
lust and hate. Mormonism was an unmitigated evil be- 
fore polygamy and blood atonement became a law of the 
church. 

The priests ruled the ignorant people with superstitious 
terror. Mormons were troublesome citizens and danger- 



MORMONISM. 47 

cms neighbors, but in Salt Lake they became hostile, trea- 
sonable and rebellious. No Gentile could get justice. 
They were abused, insulted and persecuted. Mormons 
who apostatized were threatened with death. Brigham 
Young in a sermon said : "You nasty apostates, get out 
of Utah. Rather than have apostates flourish here I will 
unsheath my bowie-knife and conquer or die." Objec- 
tionable people were murdered at will by the Danites. 

With spiritual marriages, blood atonement, endowment 
oaths and secret vows, Mormonism became a monster 
evil that is abhorrent and repulsive to all respectable 
people. 

The Mormon church to-day is not so much a religious 
society as it is a political organization. Mormons do not 
claim that they have abandoned polygamy, but have 
merely suspended its practice. In my association with 
Mormons in Utah, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming I have 
never heard one repudiate celestial marriage. I have 
heard many say : "We would still be practicing it if the 
State had not prohibited it." 

True, President Woodruff had a revelation telling Mor- 
mons to suspend the practice. How convenient it is to 
have revelations! Mrs. Eddy had an inward evidence 
that God would have her cease giving medical diplomas. 
This inward witness came after Massachusetts had passed 
a law against it. President Woodruff had a revelation 
to suspend polygamy after the United States government 
said : "Abandon this shameful abomination or go to 
prison. ' 

MORMONISM OF TO-DAY. 

We are often informed that Mormonism of 1850 is not 
the Mormonism of 1900. The anti-polygamy law, known 
as the Cullom law, was passed in 1862. All Mormons 
admit that this law was a dead letter. Mormons defied 
the law and polygamy reached its highest pinnacle after 
this law went into effect. Brigham Young had twenty- 



48 MORMONISM. 

six wives that he recognized, perhaps many more. He 
had fifty-six children — in all a neat little family of eighty- 
two. Most of these children were illegitimate. 

President John Taylor had seven wives, President 
Woodruff five, President Snow nine; Joseph F. Smith, 
now (1904) president of the Mormon church, has five 
wives and forty-two children, three of them less than 
three years of age. In his evidence before the Senate 
committee President Smith admitted that he violated the 
laws of the land. 

The Edmunds law was enacted in 1882, the Edmunds- 
Tucker law in 1887, and in 1889 nearly every apostle, 
bishop and priest was practicing celestial marriage. 
When the government brought these outlaws to trial 
many were convicted. Others fled into Mexico and went 
into banishment. In 1890, when many of the leaders 
were under arrest or in banishment, President Woodruff 
had a revelation from God suspending the practice of 
polygamy. 

Utah wanted to come into the Union as a State, and 
for this purpose Mormons pretended goodness until the 
State was admitted in 1896. Since then polygamy has 
been revived. Senator Edmunds says : "The attempted 
revival of polygamy in Utah should be opposed by all 
lawful means." 

Mormons now declare polygamy no crime. The presi- 
dent of the church, Joseph F. Smith ; August Canon, pres- 
ident of Salt Lake Stake ; Bishop Roberts and others are 
living polygamous lives in defiance of the law. 

In 1899 in open conference they declared that those 
who raise children by plural wives are not sinning and 
that polygamy is not adultery. 

George Q. Cannon declares the anti-polygamy law a 
man-made law and not God's law. The whole tenor of 
the Mormon church is to return to celestial marriage. 
The church now admits that there are 800 or 900 persons 
in Utah living polygamous lives. Others declare the 



MORMONISM. 49 

number to be 3,000. No doubt hundreds are secretly 
practicing polygamy. All declare it a command of God. 

WHAT MORMONS SAY ABOUT POLYGAMY. 

The Utah church claims that Joseph Smith gave the 
law for celestial marriage in 1843 at Nauvoo, 111. This 
revelation, they tell us, was a divine message from God. 
To reject it was to reject God. Those who rejected it 
would be damned. But a few weeks ago the elders, in 
convention at Salt Lake, declared the rejection of one 
revelation equivalent to the rejecting of all. This revela- 
tion was proclaimed to the church in 1852 by Brigham 
Young. Should any wife reject this law and refuse to 
consent to her husband taking another wife, she endan- 
gered her soul to eternal damnation. Many taught that 
the woman must be married in order to be saved. In 
1889, while on oath, Apostle J. H. Smith said : "If any 
wife refuses to consent to her husband taking another 
wife she shall be damned. I accept this revelation." The 
woman to be saved must be united with a husband in a 
spiritual sense. 

Here was a dilemma for the woman. She must suc- 
cumb to the licentious bishops and priests or be sent to 
perdition. There was no escape for her. She must ac- 
cept prostitution or damnation. This teaching has been 
toned down, until now it is admitted that woman may be 
saved in single life, but that she can not receive the great 
exaltation in Heaven that those receive who enter the 
mysteries of spiritual marriage. If this revelation was 
from God, then all Mormons who are rejecting it to-day 
are rebelling against God. If they are secretly practicing 
polygamy they are rebelling against the laws of the 
United States. 

There is a tendency among many people to recognize 
the Mormons as Christians. Believing as Christians do, 
that Joseph Smith was not inspired and that the Book of 
Mormon is spurious, they can not have fellowship with 
them for these reasons : 



50 MORMONISM. 

1. Mormons denounce all churches. "The Mormon 
church is the only true church on earth." — Doctrine and 
Covenant. Joseph Smith said : "All churches are wrong." 

2. The Mormon church places the Book of Mormon 
on an equality with the Bible. "The Book of Mormon 
and the Bible are revelations from God." — Mormon Cate- 
chism. 

3. They make belief in Joseph Smith essential to sal- 
vation. 

4. They make loyalty to the Mormon priesthood es- 
sential. "He that rejects the priesthood shall be damned." 
— Pratt's Works. 

5. Mormons teach that Adam is God. "Adam is our 
God and Father, and the only God with whom we have 
to do." — Brigham Young. 

6. They teach that God and Jesus had many wives. 
All these doctrines are antagonistic to Christianity. In- 
stead of recognizing the Mormon as a Christian, each in- 
dividual should denounce this babel of falsehood. 

The following articles, "Was Joe Smith a Prophet?" 
"The Book of Mormon Contradicts the Bible," and "Was 
Joe Smith a Polygamist ?" are prepared by Prof. John T. 
Bridwell, National Secretary of the Anti-Mormon So- 
ciety. Prof. Bridwell is the author of a valuable work 
upon "The Bible Against the Book of Mormon." 

WAS JOSEPH SMITH, JR., A PROPHET? 

The world has had many prophets. Some of them spoke for 
God, others did not. But whether true or false, from God or 
Satan, all prophets agree in their claim to divine authority. It 
necessarily follows that we cannot grant the claim in any case 
until it is sustained by proper credentials. Great Britain sends an 
ambassador to the United States. One may very solemnly assert 
that he is that ambassador, he may perform many acts usually 
appertaining to the office, and act in many ways as genuine am- 
basadors have done, but he cannot be recognized nor can his acts 
be admitted until he presents his credentials. If it transpires that 
he cannot, we at once conclude that he is not the man Great 
Britain sent. We must look for another. 

In the first place, let us determine the nature of the office to 
which Joseph Smith lays claim. The popular notion is that a 



MORMONISM. 51 

prophet is one that predicts. This is the function of the prophetic 
office that appeals most strongly to the imagination. But the pro- 
phet is so much more than a foreteller of events that we must 
regard the popular notion to be totally inadequate. The prophet, 
as the very word indicates, was the spokesman for another; his 
word was no more his own word than it was the word of his 
hearers. He was God's man and his mouth was God's mouth. 
He voiced the divine will regarding every phase of human life. 
No one, from the King on his throne to the humblest peasant, 
escaped his condemnation for sinful acts, or evaded his solemn 
warning concerning future conduct. He dealt with the most 
important problems of statesmanship and was an uncompromis- 
ing social reformer. On the meaning of the word two passages 
are classical. Exodus 7:1 says that Jehovah said to Moses : "See, 
I have made thee a god to Pharoah, and Aaron, thy brother, shall 
be thy prophet." In Exodus 4:16 He says: "And he (Aaron) 
shall be thy spokesman unto the people : and it shall come to pass 
that he shall be to thee a mouth, and thou shalt be to him a god." 
Isaiah may be considered the ideal prophet, the highest type of 
this most interesting office. In the New Testament we find no 
indication of change in its nature under the New Covenant. In 
all dispensations "the prophet became another man and received 
another heart." (See / Samuel 10:6 and p.) 

It is the general opinion that prophetic inspiration closed with 
the New Testament age, and we are to find in the Bible the fun- 
damental principles of revealed religion. Given these, and the in- 
dwelling Spirit as the divine aid to the intellectual and moral 
man, the Christian is far better equipped than if he were sur- 
rounded by a legion of prophets. If this notion were once estab- 
lished beyond doubt, it would be useless for Joseph Smith, or 
any one else, to claim this most holy office. But there has been 
no formal announcement of the close of the canon, the cessation 
of miracles, or the doing away of inspiration. While the New 
Testament is positive in asserting that there shall be no new 
gospel, none of its writers has said, "I am writing the last book," 
or, "I am the last inspired man." Any conclusion we may reach 
is the result of inference. The human mind is able to draw 
many and contradictory inferences from the same facts. No 
matter how clearly the great truths of divine writ appear to ex- 
clude modern prophets, like Smith, Dowie or Mrs. White, they 
cannot overcome the credulity of those who want such prophets. 
We will, therefore, leave this phase of the argument to others 
who have fully stated it and examine directly the credentials of 
Joseph Smith. 

Let it be emphasized that Smith's credentials must stand every 
reasonable test and eventually make good his claim. His reputed 
call, and the events connected therewith, is contained in many 
publications of the Mormon churches. In "The Pearl of Great 
Price," edition of 1902, it appears in the "Extracts from the 
Writings of Joseph Smith." His first religious experience, at 



52 MORMONISM. 

the age of fifteen, occurred during a remarkable revival at Man- 
chester, N. Y. It seems that while others, including several 
members of the Smith family, were rushing pell-mell into the 
various churches, the youthful prophet, with miraculously mature 
mind, was grappling vigorously with the problem of denomlna- 
tionalism. While "holding himself aloof from all parties," greatly 
excited by the incessant cry and tumult, and critically observing 
the use, by the various sects, of reason and sophistry to sustain 
their positions, he yet attended their meetings and tried earnestly 
to determine "who of all these parties are right," or, "if all are 
wrong together." Finally, in answer to prayer, offered in obedi- 
ence to James 1:5, the Father and Son appear to set the matter 
right. Joseph had been friendly to the Methodist church, which 
is now destined to lose a very precocious prophet. In answer to 
his query as to which he should join, he is told that he was to 
join none of them, "for they are all wrong." He told this vision 
to the Methodist minister, who became very rude to the young 
man and treated his communication "not only lightly, but with 
great contempt." His telling the story "was the cause of a great 
persecution, which continued to increase." He was "thought a 
character of sufficient importance to attract the attention of the 
great ones of the most popular sects of the day, and in a manner 
to create in them a spirit of the most bitter persecution and 
reviling." For three years, or until the 21st of September, 1823, 
he "was suffering severe persecution at the hands of all men." 
On that evening a messenger, named Moroni, appeared. Joseph 
describes his appearance at some length, but the important part 
of the story relates to his message. 

"He called me by name, and said unto me that he was a mes- 
senger sent from God, and that his name was Moroni ; that God 
had a work for me to do ; and that my name should be had for 
good and evil among all nations, kindreds and tongues, or that 
it should be both good and spoken of among all people. He said 
there was a book deposited, written upon golden plates, giving 
an account of the former inhabitants of the continent and the 
source from whence they sprang. He also said that the fulness 
of the everlasting gospel was contained in it, as delivered by the 
Savior to the ancient inhabitants ; also, that there were two 
stones in silver bows — and these stones, fastened to a breast- 
plate, constituted what is called the Urim and Thummim — depos- 
ited with the plates; and the possession and use of these stones 
were what constituted 'seers' in ancient or former times; and 
that God had prepared them for the purpose of translating the 
book." Joseph, after four years of waiting, secured the plates, 
which he translated by the aid of the Urim and Thummim and 
gave to the world as "The Book of Mormon." If the story told 
above can be sustained, Joseph Smith spoke for God and was a 
prophet. He had full and sufficient authority and it is impossi- 
ble to be saved and reject his revelations. 

There is no direct proof for a syllable of the narrative. It is 



MORMONISM. 53 

true that Joseph's mother, Lucy Smith, devotes some space to it 
in her history. This avails nothing, however, for she quotes the 
language of Joseph in every material particular, and is evidently 
dependent on him for her information. As she ought to furnish 
first-hand testimony if any one could, it is safe to say that such 
corroboration is impossible. Another thing that lies with great 
weight against the truthfulness of Joseph's narrative is its date. 
Examination discloses that this was "the second day of May, one 
thousand eight hundred and thirty-eight." The appearance of 
the Father and the Son was "on the morning of a beautiful, clear 
day early in the spring of 1820." Moroni first appears in 1823. 
From the first vision to this publication is eighteen years. It is 
nearly fifteen years after Moroni's appearance, and nearly eleven 
years from the date on which Joseph secured the plates. While 
it may be shown that the story as told by the Mormons of to-day 
antedates its first publication by Smith in 1838, it is absolutely 
impossible to connect it with the given dates. To trace it back 
of "The Writings of Joseph Smith" reveals changes and discrep- 
ancies that, in the oft quoted language of the colored preacher, 
"would spoil any man's theology." The story of the appearance 
of the Father and Son must be rejected on internal evidence. 
The language does not reveal the viewpoint of such a boy as 
Smith. He was fifteen years old, without any education other 
than the most rudimentary, and lived in an isolated, sparsely set- 
tled community. He knows too much about "different religious 
parties," "conversions," "a strife of words and a contest of opin- 
ions," "using all the power of reason or sophistry to prove their 
errors," "zealous in endeavoring to establish their own tenets 
and disprove all others," and "the extreme difficulties caused by 
the contestsof these parties of religionists." An extraordinary 
fifteen-year-old boy with a religious training and theological bias 
might with some effort understand what was going on, but all 
this happened to an untutored lad who "had never prayed vocally" 
until he had been hurled bodily into this seething maelstrom of 
sectarian contention. Opposed to the difficulties we face when 
assuming the narrative to be true, is the naturalness of another 
explanation. At some time subsequent to the vision Smith met 
Sidney Rigdon. Rigdon came from a section which had been 
set on fire by the fight of the Campbells against sectarianism. 
Their work was begun in 1809, when Thomas Campbell pub- 
lished his "Declaration and Address" at Washington, Pa. Smith 
came to the Western Reserve in time to give the questions then 
uppermost years of study before he told about his great religious 
experience. If he tells the truth, the greatest miracle in all the 
latter-day work is the fifteen-year-old theologian. If he wrote 
into his boyhood tale the experience of his riper years, he is 
merely a successful charlatan. It is also worthy of observation 
that the message delivered on this occasion was scarce worthy 
of so august messengers. It had nothing to do with any one but 
Joseph. They came solely to tell him not to join any church! 



54 MORMONISM. 

For hundreds of years God had refused light until Joseph wanted 
it. Others of the great "multitudes" who were affected by the 
excitement were just as worthy, and were undoubtedly seeking 
just as earnestly. If modern revival teaching prevailed, hun- 
dreds were seeking in the self-same way and basing their hope 
on the self-same promise of wisdom. Yet not even the least of 
the angels gives them light, while God Himself instructs Joseph. 
Why did He not send some messenger to warn them of the dan- 
ger of joining church? But this is not all. Before the Father 
and Son appeared the devil himself seems to have made a notable 
exception in favor of our "seer." He may have treated others to 
strong and pungent odors from the awful pit. In horrid night- 
mares and dismal dreams he shook trembling sinners over blue- 
blazing brimstone till hope was well nigh gone. But Joseph, in 
the full possession of all his faculties, "was immediately seized 
upon by some power which entirely overcame me, and had such 
an astonishing influence over me as to bind my tongue so that I 
could not speak. Thick darkness gathered around me, and it 
seemed to me for a time as if I were doomed to sudden destruc- 
tion." Fortunate favorite of two masters ! Alternately wooed 
by both God and Satan, is it any wonder that he should some- 
times so waver in his allegiance, that poor old David Whitmer 
declared that he belonged to the very weakest class of prophets, 
and sly Brigham Young, speaking of his character, declared that 
he "embraced no man in his religion?" 

1 But Joseph tells us about a "great persecution," which was 
all on account of his vision. Yet some of the sects in those days 
demanded just such stories as an evidence of conversion. This 
persecution involved the "great ones of the most popular sects," 
"men of high standing." "This was common among all sects — 
all united to persecute me." The churches that a few days before 
were in a "scene of great confusion and bad feeling," hopelessly 
separated, have at last found common ground. Here come 
belligerent evangelists, quarrelsome editors, and disputing doc- 
tors, "the great ones of the most popular sects," to make com- 
mon cause against a fifteen-year-old boy, living in a log cabin in 
a frontier village, a "barefooted boy, whose uncombed hair sticks 
in tangled shocks through his crownless hat," an ignorant boy, 
"who can read but little and write not at all." Can any one be 
so credulous as to believe a syllable of this story? To think that 
his neighbors gave him anything more than a smile of amused 
unbelief is to do violence to our own intelligence. He is indeed 
a prophet of prodigies, to make every one act just as do the 
characters in the "Arabian Nights !" The strangest thing of it 
all is that no trace of his remarkable persecution ever trickled 
down to us from a Gentile source. Not a case in history paral- 
lels it for successfully covering up what "the great ones of the 
most popular sects" have done. Should not the evidence be 
available to prove this marvelous rodomontrade ? 

The conclusion that there is not a word of truth in the entire 



MORMONISM. 55 

story is strengthened by its exaggerated language. Smith finds 
''great multitudes" in a sparsely settled portion of Western New 
York in 1830. There are many expressions totally out of har- 
mony with the known circumstances of the case. The word "per- 
secution" is so used. One would imagine from the repetitions 
and superlatives that the affair rivalled the cruelties of Nero and 
Domitian, yet no one was hurt. Tacitus says of the Neronian 
persecution, "They (Christians) were made the subjects of 
sport, for they were covered with the hides of wild beasts and 
worred to death by dogs, or nailed to the cross, or set fire to, 
or when day declined were burned to serve for nocturnal 
torches." But this is commonplace beside the "great persecu- 
tion," when the "public mind was excited" against a freckled- 
face boy in Western New York in 1820. 

If Joseph did not tell the truth about this vision, he did not 
speak for God and was not a prophet. 

Turning now to the story of his call, which is closely con- 
nected with the foregoing, there are several points that will repay 
examination. The limited space allowed for this article will 
forbid more than a passing notice of a number of them. We will 
place those to which we have allotted the briefest treatment first. 

(1) The book written on the golden plates gives an account 
of the former inhabitants of this country and the source from 
whence they sprang. The Book of Mormon makes the ancient 
inhabitants Israelites, who settled in this country 600 B. C. 
Some time after coming they divided into two nations, the 
Nephites or civilized portion, who were the builders of the 
important ruins in America and the authors of its civilization, 
and the Lamanites, or Indians, savage Israelites, who finally 
exterminated their civilized brethren about 400 A. D. Against 
this view is arrayed every prominent archaeologist of modern 
times. Bancroft, Baldwin, Short, de Nadaillac, Foster, Thomas, 
Brinton and many others may be named, as well as such his- 
torians as Fiske and Winzor. Not one modern authority among 
a host of writers is on the side of the Book of Mormon. The 
Indians are not Israelites. 

(2) "He also said that the fulness of the everlasting gospel 
was contained in it." The Book of Mormon adds nothing of any 
value to the religious knowledge of the world. There are many 
Bible topics which it does not touch at all. This point has been 
treated by Lamb, Braden and others. See also Chapter . 

(3) "Joseph Smith's name should be both good and evil 
spoken of among all people." Joseph had already secured the 
partial fulfillment of the prediction when it was uttered in 1838. 
He was already known through the Missouri troubles in nearly 
every nook and corner of the United States, and his missionaries 
were working in foreign lands. 

There are two points, however, of the utmost importance to 
the story, and it is proposed to subject these to a thorough ex- 
amination. Joseph Smith says an angel, Moroni, appeared to 



56 MORMONISM. 

him. If he did, Joseph received a call from some one. If he did 
not, Joseph was romancing and is not a prophet. Moroni was 
the last Nephite prophet of the Book of Mormon. He lived 
about 400 A. D. and hid the book in the earth conveniently near 
the Smith cabin in New York. It was certainly proper for him 
to come and tell Joseph about it. Yet we will show that Moroni 
never did so. This is an important point. That it is well taken 
will appear, however, from an examination of the available 
material. The story underwent many changes before it assumed 
the form published in 1838. It is sometimes fortunate that we 
can find the tool-marks of the men who have "made" his story. 
The Smith family lived in Manchester, N. Y. All agree that 
they were very poor. Their neighbors very generally agree that 
they were not the best family in the village. Joseph Smith him- 
self settles the question as to whether they were money-diggers. 
He says that in October, 1825, he worked for an old gentleman 
named Josiah Stoal, digging for a silver mine. He continued for 
a month. "Hence arose the very prevalent story of my being a 
money-digger." Lucy Smith says that Stoal had heard that 
Joseph possessed certain keys, and came for Joseph on that 
account. As Stoal lived in Pennsylvania, quite a distance from 
Manchester, Joseph had something of a reputation even as early 
as 1825, while yet in his twentieth year. When he was in Penn- 
sylvania, digging for the mine, he made the acquaintance of the 
Hales and Lewises. In a letter dated Amboy, Lee County, 111., 
April 23, 1879, Hill and Joseph Lewis, near relatives of Emma 
Hale Smith, the prophet's wife, tell us that even then the prophet 
was known as peeper Joe Smith. They state that "he said that 
by a dream he was informed that at such a place in a certain 
hill, in an iron box, were some gold plates with curious engrav- 
ings, which he might get and translate and write a book; that 
the plates were to be kept from every human being for a certain 
time, some two or three years ; that he went to the place and 
dug till he came to the stone that covered the box, when he was 
knocked down ; that he again attempted to move the stone and 
was again knocked down. The attempt was made the third time, 
and the third time he was knocked down. Then he exclaimed, 
'Why can't I git it?' or words to that effect, and then he saw a 
man standing over the spot, who, to him, appeared like a Span- 
iard (Moroni was a Nephite. — B.), having a long beard down 
over his breast to about here (Smith putting his hand to the pit 
of his stomach), with his (the ghost's) throat cut from ear to 
ear, and the blood streaming down, who told him that he could 
not get it alone; that another person whom he (Smith) would 
know at first sight must come with him, and then he would get 
it; and when he saw Emma Hale he knew that she was the 
person, and that after they were married she went with him to 
near the place and stood with her back toward him while he dug 
after the box, which he rolled up in his frock, and she helped 
to carry it home ; that in the same box were the spectacles ; the 



MORMONISM. 57 

bows were of gold and the eyes were of stone, and by looking 
through these spectacles all the characters on the plates were 
translated into English. In all this narrative there was not one 
word about visions of God, or of angels, or heavenly revela- 
tions ; all his information was by that dream and by that bleeding 
ghost." It is evident that Moroni, the Nephite angel, is not yet 
above the prophet's horizon of consciousness. Another remark- 
able thing is that the Father and Son, who visited the prophet 
in 1820, when he was fifteen years old, are neither of them men- 
tioned. The Messrs. Lewis inform us that he had so far forgot- 
ten their wholesome advice concerning the wicked denominations 
as to join the Methodist church, of which he remained a member 
for three days. They compelled him to withdraw his name on 
account of his reputation at the end of that time. One cannot 
help thinking of the way the "Lord" talks to Joseph in one of 
his revelations : "And behold how oft ye have transgressed the 
commandments and the laws of God." It was natural for 
Joseph to do that — at least, David Whitmer thought so. The 
strangest thing is that Joseph joined the Methodist church in 
1828, when he had the plates in his possession that were to make 
him the prophet and founder of a new church. 

About this time the bleeding ghost completes a metamor- 
phosis. This happened in the Smith cabin while Joseph was yet 
in Pennsylvania. Abigail Harris says that "in the early part of 
the winter of 1828 (December. — B.), Joseph and Lucy Smith, 
the prophet's parents, told me that the report that young Joseph 
had found golden plates was true, and that he was in Harmony, 
Pa., translating them ; that such plates were in existence, and 
that young Joseph was to obtain them was revealed to him by 
the spirit of one of the saints who was on this continent previous 
to its discovery by Columbus. Old Mrs. Smith observed that 
she thought he must be a Quaker, as he was dressed very plain." 
This prompts us to ask, "Why didn't the Lord let Joseph join 
the Quakers in 1820?" The spirit of this pre-Columbian must 
have joined them long after the extinction of the Nephite Chris- 
tians, for the sect is of too recent origin for him to have joined 
them in ancient America. This change to a pre-Columbian angel 
had taken place in December, 1828. When in February, 1828, 
Martin Harris took the transcript of the Book of Mormon "char- 
acters" to Professor Charles Anthon he said nothing at all about 
the angel. After this visit Joseph Smith told Henry Harris that 
he "had a revelation from God that they (the gold plates) were 
hid in a certain hill, and he looked in his stone and saw the 
place of deposit ; that an angel appeared and told him he could 
not get the plates until he was married." Joseph then told him 
of the visit of Martin Harris to Dr. Anthon. Therefore the 
bleeding Spaniard of 1825 to 1828 became a pre-Columbian angel 
of the Quaker faith between February and December, 1828. 
Just when he was christened Moroni it is impossible to tell. It 
certainly was not in December, 1828, for it is not conceivable 



58 MORMONISM. 

that Lucy Smith could have refrained from telling Abigail Harris 
if she had known the Quaker's name. If a revelation contained 
in Book of Doctrine and Covenants (Josephite, 26; Brighamite, 
27) were trustworthy, the date could be fixed as early as Septem- 
ber, 1830. Even this would be several months subsequent to the 
publication of the Book of Mormon. But this revelation has 
been much altered since its first publication in the Book of Com- 
mandments, 1833. In this book it contains but seven verses, and 
the last two read: "Behold, this is wisdom in me, wherefore 
marvel not; for the hour cometh that I will drink of the fruit 
of the vine with yois, on the earth, and with all those whom my 
Father hath given me out of the world. Wherefore, lift up your 
hearts and rejoice, and gird your loins and be faithful until I 
come : — even so. Amen." The Brighamite version contains eight- 
een verses. It is identical with the original to the italicized por- 
tion, which reads : "And with Moroni, whom I have sent unto 
you to reveal the Book of Mormon, containing the fulness of my 
everlasting gospel, to whom I have committed the record of the 
stick of Ephraim." The evident inference is that Moroni had 
not appeared on the scene even as late as 1833. This was ten 
years after Joseph said he came. So far as the records can be 
depended on to settle the question, he made his formal debut in 
1835, when the first edition of the Book of Doctrine and Cove- 
nants was published. Joseph certainly did not speak for God 
when he made this little slip about Moroni. 

Another feature of great importance in the story of Smith's 
call is the Urim and Thummim. This instrument served a 
double purpose. In ancient times to possess and use it made one 
a "seer." By implication the same thing holds good to-day. The 
difference between Joseph Smith and John Alexander Dowie is 
all in the Urim and Thummim. It also translated the Book of 
Mormon ; at least, it should have translated it, for God prepared 
it for that purpose. We are now ready for another weak point 
in the story. Moroni (who was not there, as we have shown 
above) said not a word about the instrument. This is one of 
Joseph's mistakes. In 1825-8 the Messrs. Lewis mention a pair 
of spectacles. The description is peculiar. "The bows were of 
gold and the eyes were of stone, and by looking through these 
spectacles all the characters on the plates were translated into 
English." Martin Harris told Dr. Anthon that the translation 
of the book was accomplished by spectacles. We are able to find 
other early witnesses to prove that there were spectacles, but 
none of them ever heard of the Urim and Thummim. Here the 
story told by Smith in 1838 is different from the testimony. To 
understand the development of this wonderful instrument let us 
go back to the prophet's boyhood. His father says that he 
became acquainted with the peeping business in his fourteenth 
year. He "happened to be where a man was looking ; nto a dark 
stone and telling people where to dig for money and other things. 
Joseph requested the privilege of looking into the stone, which 



MORMONISM. 59 

he did by putting his face into the hat where the stone was. It 
proved not to be the right stone for him ; but he could see some 
things, and among them he saw a stone, and where it was, in 
which he could see whatever he wished to see." "After this 
Joseph spent about two years looking into this stone, telling for- 
tunes, where to find lost things, and where to dig for money and 
other hidden treasures." In this connection we must not forget 
Joseph's keys, "by which he could discern things invisible to the 
naked eye," which Mother Smith said caused Josiah Stoal to 
come all the way from Pennsylvania to get Joseph to dig a silver 
mine. He had been a "gazer" or "peeper" for some time before 
his marriage to Emma Hale. It was this fact that cut honest 
Isaac Hale to the heart and caused him to oppose the union with 
all the energy of his proud nature. Mormons, however, indig- 
nantly deny that he was ever a "peeper." His own admission, 
taken with the statements of his parents, makes the denial look 
very much like a desperate bluff. According to one of the wit- 
nesses, the golden plates were first discovered by means of a 
peep-stone, perhaps the one he got from Chase. From the first 
it clings to the prophet with awful tenacity. He was able to get 
rid of the Spanish ghost, which we have traced through two or 
three changes to the angel Moroni. The "spectacles" first con- 
tested the field with the stone, but they were unable to replace it. 
They appear in 1825, again in 1828, and are called by the classic 
name of Urim and Thummim in the record of 1838 ; but the peep- 
stone, his alter ego, keeps him company to the last. In spite of 
God's thoughtfulness in providing the spectacles, under a high- 
sounding name, for the purpose of translating the book, in spite 
of Joseph's assertion that the Urim and Thummim did the work, 
the stone appears to claim the lion's share of the honor. He had 
duped his followers so well with it that he might add to the story, 
but he could not subtract from it. Let us place side by side 
some of the testimony. 

"There were two stones in silver bows, and these stones, 
fastened to a breast-plate, constituted the Urim and Thummim — 
deposited with the plates ; and the possession and the use of 
these stones were what constituted 'seers' in ancient or former 
times ; and that God had prepared them for the purpose of trans- 
lating the book." This is from Joseph. He obtained the instru- 
ment September 23, 1827. Later he says, "I copied a considerable 
number of them (the engravings), and by means of Urim and 
Thummim I translated some of them," etc. In 1838 he mentions 
no other means of translating. Orson Pratt's works, Page 222, 
says, "Mr. Smith, through the aid of the Urim and Thummim, 
and by the gift and power of God, translated his record into 
English." Parley Pratt, "Voice of Warning," testifies to the 
same thing. Now for another story. 

Mrs. Emma Smith, the wife of the prophet, says : "In writ- 
ing for your father I frequently wrote day after day, often sitting 
at the table close by him, he sitting with his face buried in his 



60 MORMONISM. 

hat, with the stone in it, and dictating hour after hour, with 
nothing between us." There is only a stone in Joseph's hat ! No 
spectacles and no Urim and Thummim consisting of two crystal 
stones in silver bows. Martin Harris, Joseph's first scribe, says 
that the prophet possessed a "seer stone," "by which he was 
enabled to translate as well as from the Urim and Thummim, 
and that for convenience he used the seer stone." Martin told 
this after Joseph's attempted modification of the story in 1838, 
for even he saw the futility of trying to get rid of the stone. He 
contradicts the prophet, Moroni, the two Pratts and others when 
he says the seer stone, which is certainly not the Urim and 
Thummm, did the work ! David Whitmer, one of the witnesses 
to the Book of Mormon, in "An Address to All Believers," says : 
"I will now give you a description of the manner in which the 
Book of Mormon was translated. Joseph would put the seer 
stone into a hat, and his face in the hat, drawing it closely around 
his face to exclude the light, and in the darkness the celestial 
light would shine." This is very much like the "peeping" per- 
formances described by some of Smith's New York neighbors. 
The same may be said of the statement of Emma Smith. Even 
the modus operandi of the old faking occupation is preserved in 
these accredited Mormon witnesses, not only to confute the later 
stories of the prophet, but to establish beyond a doubt the credi- 
bility of the early testimony against him. But with the evident 
intention of making this witches' broth of contradictions com- 
plete, David Whitmer said, through the columns of the Deserct 
News, that "the tablets or plates were translated by Smith, who 
used a small oval or kidney-shaped stone, called Urim and Thum- 
mim, that seemed endowed with the marvelous power of con- 
verting the characters on the plates, when used by Smith, into 
English, who would then dictate to Cowdery what to write." As 
this description of the Urim and Thummim does not agree with 
the one given by the mythical Moroni, the News rushes to the 
front with a correction of Mr. Whitmer (who was a witness, the 
News was not!) as follows: "The next error is that the seer 
stone which Joseph Smith used in the translation was called 
Urim and Thummim. The instrument thus designated was com- 
posed of two crystal stones set in the two rims of the bow." But 
Whitmer's story of how Joseph got Urim and Thummim No. 2 
is of interest, as it shows that he was able to invent quite as good 
a one as was Joseph. As it is one of the constituents of the 
broth, we may neglect our observations on the first appearance 
of the name Urim and Thummim long enough to tell it. Smith, 
during the translation, offended the angel, who took from him 
both the plates and the Urim and Thummim. Smith repented 
(he was good at both sinning and repenting) and was forgiven. 
"The plates, however, were not returned, but instead, Smith was 
given by the angel a Urim and Thummim of another pattern, it 
being shaped in oval or kidney form. This worked just as satis- 
factory as the old method, but at no time thereafter was the 



MORMONISM. 61 

back-sliding Joseph intrusted with the precious plates." This 
certainly should squelch both Moroni and the News. But if it 
does not, Mother Lucy Smith, whose book Brigham Young sup- 
pressed, certainly does. She says: "I took the article of which 
he spoke (the Urim and Thummim) into my hands, and, upon 
examination, found that it consisted of two smooth three-cor- 
nered diamonds set in glass, and the glasses were set in silver 
bows, which were connected with each other in much the same 
way as old-fashioned spectacles." The same instinct that prompts 
the average daughter of Eve to embroider a bodice led Mother 
Smith to put on a few extra touches to adorn the Urim and 
Thummim! Yet how wonderfully it has multiplied the inspira- 
tion of the prophet! Three Urim and Thummim and a seer 
stone ! No wonder the Book of Doctrine and Covenants says he 
"has done more (save Jesus only) for the salvation of men in 
this world than any other man that ever lived in it." Given one 
more Urim and Thummim and Jesus would be a poor second. 
Here let us repel a base libel with which tEe saintly Whitmer 
assails the prophetic standing of the Latter-Day translator. He 
says that Joseph never again possessed the Urim and Thummim 
and plates. Joseph says he did; so does Lucy Smith. She 
adorns the story of their return by placing them in a red 
morocco trunk on Emma's bureau. Joseph is glad to get the 
same old-fashioned spectacles he had at first instead of Whit- 
mer's new stone, and he is not at all exacting about the color 
and finish of the case. 

But to return to the first appearance of the name. Joseph's 
revelations again furnish light. In the Book of Doctrine and 
Covenants (Josephite, Sec. 3; Brighamite, Sec. 10) is the fol- 
lowing: "Now, behold, I say unto you, that because you deliv- 
ered up those writings, which you had power given you to trans- 
late, by the means of the Urim and Thummim, into the hands of 
a wicked man, you have lost them," etc. This revelation in the 
Book of Commandments, Sec. 9 reads : "Now, behold, I say 
unto you, that because you delivered up so many writings, which 
you had power to translate, into the hands of a wicked man, you 
have lost them," etc. We ask, Why did Joseph find it necessary 
to revise the word of the Lord by inserting the words, "by the 
means of the Urim and Thummim?" The answer is that he 
wished the revised revelations to sustain his revised story. Some 
time prior to 1835 the Urim and Thummim fraud was born. But 
another revelation is at hand. Doctrine and Covenants (Joseph- 
ite, 15; Brighamite, 17) reads: "Behold, I say unto you, that 
you must rely on my word, which if you do, with full purpose of 
heart, you shall have a view of the plates, and also of the breast- 
plate, the sword of Laban, the Urim and Thummim, which was 
given to the brother of Jared on the mount," etc. This revela- 
tion does not appear in the Book of Commandments. While it 
is dated June, 1829, and the Book of Commandments appeared 
in 1833, the revelation was first published in 1835. Dr. Wyl says 



62 MORMONISM. 

that the name Urim and Thummim was first used by W. W. 
Phelps about the time of the publication of the Book of Com- 
mandments. This is ten years after Moroni's visit. In the in- 
terim the work of translating is done by seer stones and stone 
spectacles! What a blessed thing it is that the more dignified 
instrument came soon enough to get into the second edition of the 
revelations, at the same time belated Moroni makes his advent ! 
But if Moroni and the Urim and Thummim are frauds, what of 
the call of Joseph Smith? Another significant fact is that both 
Moroni and the spectacles are in the Book of Mormon. If they 
were familiar to the prophet and his colaborers prior to January, 
1830, as they must have been, how is it that no one knew till 1833, 
or thereabouts, that it was Moroni who revealed the book to 
Joseph, and that the spectacles were Urim and Thummim? The 
Book of Mormon calls them "interpreters," and Moroni knew 
them by no other name. How came he to call them "Urim and 
Thummim?" But what is the sense in trying to understand this 
tangled mass of contradictions, when Joseph was able to do just 
as well with the old peep-stone of his money-digging days as hz < 
could with even the Urim and Thummim described by his' 
mother, which beat all the others by being composed of three- 
cornered diamonds set in glass? He would have been a prophet 
even if compelled to translate with the measliest pebble in New 
York, and would have duped his satellites with a story to 
prove it. 

But David Whitmer, one of the three witnesses to the Book 
of Mormon, in the Address before quoted, throws great light on 
his prophetic powers, and incidentally on the intrinsic worth of 
seer stones, Urim and Thummim and all such machinery in the 
following narrative. When the Book of Mormon was in the 
hands of the printer Martin Harris was slow in selling his farm 
to pay him. Brother Hyrum (Smith) was vexed and wanted to 
sell the Canadian copyright in Toronto. He persuaded Joseph 
to inquire of the Lord about it. "He had not yet given up the 
stone. Joseph looked into the hat in which he had placed the 
stone and received a revelation that some of the brethren should 
go to Toronto, Canada, and that they would sell the copyright 
of the Book of Mormon. Hiram Page and Oliver Cowdery went 
to Toronto on this mission, but they failed entirely to sell the 
copyright, returning witho v ut any money. Joseph was at my 
father's house when they returned. I was there also and am an 
eye-witness of these facts. * * * Well, we were all in a great 
trouble, and we asked Joseph how it was that he had received a 
revelation from the Lord for some brethren to go to Toronto to 
sell the copyright and the brethren had utterly failed in their un- 
dertaking. Joseph did not know how it was, so he inquired of 
the Lord about it, and, behold, the following revelation came 
through the stone : 'Some revelations are of God ; some revela- 
tions are of man, and some revelations are of the devil.' " What 
a foxy seer! — stone. Whitmer very sagely remarks: "So we 



MORMONISM. 63 

see that the revelation to go to Toronto and sell the copyright 
was not of God, but was of the devil, or the heart of man." One 
would have to be blinder than an earthworm, or even an ortho- 
dox Mormon, not to see that. But with the mask pulled off all 
this heaven-dishonoring mummery, is that all we are to see? The 
believing David informs us that this was the same stone through 
which the Book of Mormon was translated — the great stone of 
Joseph's seership. He continues : "I will say here that I could 
tell you other false revelations that came through Joseph as a 
mouthpiece (not through the stone), but this will suffice." Well, 
it will suffice for most people. He tells us that "in Kirtland, Ohio, 
in 1831, Rigdon would expound the Old Testament scriptures of 
the Bible and the Book of Mormon (in his way) to Joseph, con- 
cerning the priesthood, high priests, etc., and would persuade 
Joseph to inquire of the Lord about this doctrine and that doc- 
trine, and, of course, a revelation would always come just as 
they desired it." "Brother Joseph would listen to the per- 
suasions of men and inquire of the Lord concerning different 
things, and the revelations would come just as they desired and 
thought in their hearts." Brother Joseph was certainly a very 
handy prophet. No one need ever go astray in religion if he can 
have a prophet at hand to head him off at every turn with a 
revelation declaring whatever he wants to believe and do to be 
exactly right. Mormons contend that Whitmer was honest and 
intelligent. If they are right, Smith did not speak for God. 

In regard to the prophet's character our witness again testi- 
fies : "From this you will see that Brother Joseph belonged to 
the weakest class — the class that were very liable to fall." He 
then quotes at length a revelation containing, "How oft have you 
transgressed the commandments and the laws of God, and have 
gone on in the persuasions of men," and, "thou hast suffered the 
counsel of thy Director to be trampled on from the beginning." 
This was while the Book was being translated, when, in Whit- 
mer's opinion, Joseph should have possessed the greatest sanctity. 
Transported by the thought of the prophet's delinquencies, he 
exclaims : "Now, if he was so weak at that time, is it any won- 
der that he erred in 1830, and after that time? Of course not! 
Ah, brethren, great are the mysteries of God!" Yes, great in- 
deed; but what mysteries? Had God intended to do something 
so mysterious as to paralyze every faculty of the human mind, 
the way to do it was to use Joseph Smith for his prophet. When 
David charged his Maker with an unimaginable offense, he cov- 
ered his inability to maintain the charge by expatiating on "the 
mysteries of God." The man who had "suffered the counsel of 
his Director to be trampled under foot from the beginning." 
His inspired spokesman ! No wonder Mormonism is spending 
some of its best efforts in deciding "which of his revelations are 
of God, which are of man, and which are of the devil." But to 
increase our faith in this weakest of prophets, let us try another 
"mystery." We have seen how the second edition of Smith's 



64 MORMONISM. 

revelations opened the door for Moroni, bearing in his angelic 
hands the wonderful Urim and Thummim. There were many 
other changes. We are frequently informed that this was to cor- 
rect a few typographical errors. Whitmer assails the alterations 
with an unsparing hand. He shows clearly that the intention 
was to introduce new doctrines. Joseph had given these revela- 
tions to the world as the word of God. If they were the word 
of God before their mutilation, what are they now? If Joseph 
thus trifled with the Spirit's message given through him, how 
much confidence can we have in anything he said? His revela- 
tions were first bogus and then doctored — a double imposition 
on credulity and superstition. 

One of the frequently reiterated claims of the Mormons is 
that Joseph's predictions came true. Some of them have been 
frequently examined. The one relating to the civil war is most 
prominent. A single sentence, however, spoils it all. "The days 
will come that wars will be poured out upon the nations, begin- 
ning at that place (South Carolina), for, behold, the Southern 
States shall be divided against the Northern States, and the 
Southern States will call on other nations, even the nation of 
Great Britain, as it is called, and they shall call upon other na- 
tions, in order to defend themselves against other nations; and 
thus war shall be poured out upon all nations." With his quite 
natural tendency for big things, Joseph began too many wars in 
South Carolina. One would have made him a prophet; to pour 
them out upon all nations, involving Great Britain and others, 
makes him the same juggler who revised his previous revelations 
to make a new role for Moroni, and to open the door for the 
high-sounding Urim and Thummim. It is useless and sillv to 
bring in Great Britain and other nations "diplomatically," as 
does W. W. Blair in the Josephite edition of the "Voice of Warn- 
ing." When the other nations get into the prophesy, Joseph 
hears the roar and rumble of big guns; "war shall be poured 
out upon all nations." The rebellion was settled without any 
outside interference in favor of either side. The Book of Mor- 
mon contains many of his predictions. In 77 Nephi 3:14-15, Jo- 
seph, the Hebrew, is represented as saying: "Behold, that seer 
(Joseph Smith) will the Lord bless, and they that seek to destroy 
him shall be confounded; for this promise of which I have ob- 
tained of the Lord, of the fruit of my loins shall be fulfilled. 
Behold, I am sure of the fulfilling of this promise, and his name 
shall be called after me; and it shall be after the name of his 
father." While this prediction is attributed to Joseph of the Old 
Testament, it was never heard of before the Joseph whose "name 
was after the name of his father" published it in 1830. But this 
is not the most serious objection. It is a notorious fact that 
those who sought to destroy the prophet succeeded but too well. 
The "seer" and his brother were murdered by a mob in Carthage 
jail in 1844. The prediction was not so "sure," after all. In 777 
Nephi 21:10 Jesus, who visited the Nephites on this continent, 



MORMONISM. 65 

said of Joseph Smith : "But, behold, the life of my servant shall 
be in my hand ; therefore, they shall not hurt him, although he 
shall be marred because of them." He certainly was badly marred 
by the bullets at Carthage, but, as he was "not hurt," we are 
compelled to ask why the Mormons make such a protest against 
his assassination. Jesus further says : "Yet I will heal him, for 
I will show unto them that my wisdom is greater than the cun- 
ning of the devil." The obvious conclusions are that Joseph, 
the Hebrew, and Jesus had nothing to do with these predictions ; 
that, as they were first found in a writing coming from Joseph 
Smith's pen, he was the real author ; and, as they failed to come 
true, that he was a false prophet. In the same connection with 
the first prediction (// Nephi 3:11) Joseph, the patriarch, says, 
"and unto him (Smith) will I give power to bring forth my 
word unto the seed of thy loins ; and not the bringing forth of 
my word only, saith the Lord, but to the convincing of them of 
my word which shall have already gone forth among them." 
Smith "brought forth" the Book of Mormon. The prediction 
says that this is not all his work. The "seed of thy loins" are 
the American Indians. "My word, which shall have already gone 
forth among them," is the Bible. Joseph with his new book was 
to convince the Indians that the Bible is true. Between him and 
the fulfillment of the prediction looms the ghastly spectacle of 
Carthage jail, for he died without making the least impression 
on the "seed of Joseph." Smith again had the honor of publish- 
ing this prediction for the first time. Perhaps the most painful 
failure the prophet ever made was the series of predictions and 
promises relating to Zion. The Book of Mormon predicts the 
building of a New Jerusalem on this continent. When Smith 
thought the time ripe he prepared to build it. In March, 1831, 
he reveals the word of the Lord as follows : "Gather up your 
riches that ye may purchase an inheritance which shall hereafter 
be appointed to you, and it shall be called the New Jerusalem, a 
land of peace, a city of refuge, a place of safety for the saints of 
the Most High God; and the glory of the Lord shall be there, 
and the terror of the Lord shall be there, insomuch that the 
wicked shall not come into it ; and it shall be called Zion. And 
it shall come to pass that every man who will not take up his 
sword against his neighbor must needs flee to Zion for safety. 
And there shall be gathered out of it of every nation under 
heaven ; and it shall be the only people that shall not be at war 
one with another. And it shall be said among the wicked, let 
us not go up to battle against Zion, for the inhabitants of Zion 
are terrible, wherefore we cannot stand." Doc. and Cov. 45:66- 
70 (Brighamite). 

In July of the same year Zion was located with Independence, 
Mo., for "the center place." A number of church officials were 
"planted" here, a temple site designated by revelation, and pro- 
vision made for the purchase of lands "for the good of the 
saints." Mormon settlers came in rapidly. Their Missouri neigh- 



66 MORMONISM. 

bors disliked them for reasons religious, social, and political, and 
the land of "peace" and "city of refuge" became so unsafe for 
the "saints of the Most High God" that it was absolutely unten- 
able. Those "inhabitants of Zion" who were to be so "terrible" 
that their enemies could not stand against them were driven from 
"the land of their inheritance" in a struggle as deplorable as any 
recorded in history. The poor victims of deception and fanati- 
cism suffered untold hardship as well as the utter failure of their 
hopes. Smith was as prompt with a revelation to fit the case as 
he had been when the Canada mission failed. He did not dare 
say, "Some revelations are of God; some revelations are of man, 
and some revelations are of the devil," but he had one equally 
as good. He announced: "I (God) have sworn, and the decree 
hath gone forth in a former commandment which I have given 
unto you, that I would let fall the sword of mine indignation in 
behalf of my people ; and even as I have said it shall come to 
pass." * * * "Zion shall not be moved out of her place, not- 
withstanding her children are scattered ; they that remain and 
are pure in heart shall return and come to their inheritances, 
they and their children, with songs of everlasting joy to build 
up the waste places of Zion." Doc. and Cov. 101:10, 17-18 (Brig- 
hamite). But this never came to pass. The same revelation tells 
us that "the Lord of the vineyard (Zion) said to one of his serv- 
ants, Go and gather the residue of my servants, and take all the 
strength of mine house, which are my warriors, my young men, 
and those that are of middle age," etc. verse 55. These were to 
get straightway to my land, break down the walls of mine ene- 
mies, avenge me of mine enemies, etc. So certain is this result 
that "honorable men" were to be appointed to purchase lands. In 
Sec. 103:11 Joseph says, "But verily I say unto you, I have de- 
creed that your brethren which have been scattered shall return 
to the land of their inheritance and build up the waste places of 
Zion." This was seventy years ago on February 24th, 1904. It 
is high time that the brethren who were scattered were getting 
back. In verse 16, after having said that the redemption of Zion 
must come with power he says, "Therefore I will raise up unto 
my people a man, who shall lead them like Moses led the chil- 
dren of Israel." This great deliverer was Joseph Smith. He 
proceeded to raise his army and marched to Missouri. When 
he got there he valiantly disbanded it, after giving them a reve- 
lation saying that God had brought them to Missouri to try their 
faith. Thus this valiant general "marched up the hill and down 
again." It is quite a poor compliment to Moses to imitate that 
there was any similarity between the deliverance of the Hebrews, 
one of the most stupendous achievements of the ages, and this 
silly fiasco. Notwithstanding every man of his great army of in- 
vasion is dead, and the babe in arms when Joseph was murdered 
is now an old man, Zion is still in the hands of "the enemy." 
Jackson county now has a population of 200,000 to be dispos- 
sessed. There are near 4,000,000 in Missouri, all of whom, with 



MORMONISM. 67 

the exception of an inconderable handful, are Gentiles. So 
completely have the flying years plucked the prophetic laurels 
from Joseph's brow! We have stood with the prophet in the 
presence of the father and Son and have found that the vision 
was composed of the tangled web of fancy; we have seen the 
story of the prophetic call developed by his creative genius from 
rude beginnings that promised little of the after-glory that made 
him a rival of Mohammed and won for him a martyr's crown 
and name ; we have entered the inner circle and heard from the 
lips of one whom Emma Smith believed to her dying day to be 
"an honest and truthful man" secrets of the Urim and Thummim 
to enlighten the most abstruse; and finally we have seen the pre- 
dictions with which he stirred the enthusiasm of his followers 
tried by the lapse of time and their failure demonstrated. All 
leads to but one conclusion. Joseph Smith, ignorant and unedu- 
cated, was one of the shrewdest imposters that ever practiced on 
the credulity of man. "Great are the mysteries of God" cries the 
devout Whitmer, after reciting experiences that should have 
opened the eyes of one born blind. "Great are the mysteries of 
God" echoes through all the churches of Mormondom as the 
"saints" contemplate the mass of crudities, contradictions, and 
impossibilities that constitutes their faith. Nothing equal to it 
can be found in all the history of the race. Three hundred thou- 
sand people believe in him as heaven-sent and God-inspired ! 

WAS JOSEPH SMITH A POLYGAMIST ? 

One of the most important questions connected with Mor- 
monism concerns the origin of American polygamy. Was it from 
Joseph Smith, from John C. Bennett, or from Brigham Young? 
From the Mormon churches comes a babel of conflicting answers, 
which has found recent expression in our leading magazines and 
newspapers. 

Joseph Smith, the son of the prophet and president of the 
Reorganized church, is the foremost advocate of the theory of 
his father's innocence. He has contributed recent articles to the 
Arena and North American Review. These have called forth 
replies from President Joseph F. Smith, of the Utah church, and 
the writer. Joseph F. Smith insists that his uncle was a polyga- 
mist and practiced it by divine authority. •> 

It might appear that the question is of interest to the Mormon 
sects alone, but a nearer view will at once reveal its true signifi- 
cance. The Reorganized church is attempting to clear the mem- 
ory of Joseph Smith of this reproach as an important step in its 
evangelistic program. Just how the effort began will appear 
later. Wiser than the Hedrickites, who repudiate the confessed 
deeds of the prophet as without divine warrant, they see that the 
self-respecting people of America will never flee to their rock of 
shelter while they believe Joseph Smith to have been a polyga- 
mist. The contention is new to the great mass of the religious 



68 MORMONISM. 

world. For many years the prophet's connection with the revela- 
tion of July 12, 1843, has been so unquestioned that it is a matter 
of surprise to hear it vociferously denied. The intent of this 
chapter is to show that there is no good reason for abandoning 
the long-accepted view. 

That neither the Utah church nor the Reorganization lack 
witnesses is certainly a notable feature of the conflict. So much 
contradictory testimony, from men and women who should know, 
seems very confusing to the novice. The question is one of such 
apparent simplicity that he naturally looks for a decided prepon- 
derance. That men and women in close touch with the prophet, 
his daily companions, vitally disagree is in complete accord with 
what have been believed to be the facts from the earliest date by 
all other than Mormon historians. 

_ Joseph Smith, the "seer," was a practical polygamist both at 
Kirtland, O., and in Missouri ; i. e., as opportunity offered he 
enjoyed what were afterwards called the "blessings of Abraham, 
Isaac and Jacob." A few shared his confidence and partook with 
him of these blessings. Thus, by gathering about him a chosen 
circle of choice spirits, he prepared the way for the "revelation" 
of July 12, 1843. _ At Nauvoo he continued a policy which had 
become characteristic, even after the "revelation" had come. On 
subjects of high spiritual import, like the number of his liaisons, 
the godless Gentile had no right to know the truth, and the 
"weak brother" among the saints was "unable to receive it." 
Double-dealing, while surrounded by indignant and outraged 
neighbors, and in a church but partly prepared for a reign of 
lust, was an absolute necessity. Not till Young and the Twelve 
had safely conducted Zion to far-away Utah was the truth 
avowed. Thus it happened thai; some of his associates knew 
Smith to be a polygamist ; others thought he was not. 

The Utah Mormons must admit that the early church pur- 
sued this policy or abandon the fight to the Reorganization. 
Joseph gave the revelation and denounced John C. Bennett's 
secret-wife system. Hyrum Smith denounced an elder for teach- 
ing polygamy and married his sister-in-law. The Ladies' Aid 
Society of Nauvoo signed a letter declaring Bennett's disclosures 
to be "of his own make," when several of them, on the testimony 
of Mrs. Sarah M. Pratt, wife of one of the twelve apostles, were 
already the "spiritual" wives and willing mistresses of the pro- 
phet. John Taylor denied polygamy in France in 1850 in a public 
debate, although ten women in Salt Lake City were anxiously 
listening for the click of the front gate and the sound of his 
advancing footsteps coming up the walk. They denied till denial 
was useless, when, in 1852, Brigham Young produced the revela- 
tion and virtually confessed that the church had been deceiving 
the world for all these years. 

Here it may be well to notice one of the points made by Presi- 
dent Smith, of the Reorganization, in the North American Re- 
view. He says that the laws of New York, under which the 



MORMONISM. 69 

church was organized, "forbade bigamy, or polygamy, and made 
provision for the punishment of any infraction of monogamic 
institutions." "The church flourished in New York, Ohio, Mis- 
souri and Illinois for fourteen years, during which Joseph and 
Hyrum Smith were connected with it, always under the legal 
enactments which recognized monogamy as the American ideal 
of the domestic relation." This argues nothing, but evades the 
question at issue. Polygamy was and is a crime in every State 
and Territory of the American Union. 

The issue raised by the opponents of Mormonism is, "Was 
Joseph Smith guilty of crime?" Their ground of opposition to 
the entire system is that in its origins that system was wrong 
and immoral. It was to be expected that Smith would profess 
to keep the law. So would his confederates. Of what value is 
his plea of "not guilty?" Is it worth any more than John Tay- 
lor's, publicly entered before a large audience in 1850? Every 
violator of the law makes this plea so long as there is any thought 
of a failure to convict him. He may even denounce in unmeas- 
ured terms the "wicked lying" of those who testify against him. 

Upon one point there can be no disagreement. Polygamy of 
some sort existed in Nauvoo in the days of John C. Bennett. 
This illustrious "doctor," "general" or whatever else he may have 
been, came to Nauvoo in 1840, joined the church and received 
his patriarchal blessing at the hands of Hyrum Smith September 
19th of that year. He stayed about eighteen months, serving as 
mayor, chancellor of the university and general of the Nauvoo 
Legion, and was, next to the prophet, the most prominent figure 
in Nauvoo. He was made a member of the First Presidency in 
April, 1842, to serve during the incapacity of Sydney Rigdon, 
and Judge Stephen A. Douglass appointed him a master in chan- 
cery. Rigdon said of him April 23, 1842: "He is a physician of 
great, celebrity, of great versatility and talent, of refined educa- 
tion and accomplished manners ; discharges the duties of his 
respective offices with honor to himself and credit to the people." 

In Volume II, No. 15, of the Times and Seasons the Lord 
says : "I have seen the work which he hath done, which I 
accept, if he continue, and will crown him with blessings and 
great glory." On May 17, 1842, Bennett withdrew from the 
church. Smith directed the clerk of the church to permit him 
to do so, "and this with the best feelings toward you and General 
Bennett." The Wasp, of June 25, calls this refined gentleman, 
whose work the Lord had accepted, "an impostor and a base 
adulterer." The same complimentary epithets are used in the 
Times and Seasons of June 1st. The reason for this change of 
front was the publication by Bennett of a series of letters in the 
Sangamon Journal, in which he claimed to expose the villainies 
practiced at Nauvoo. After Bennett's book appeared the Times 
and Seasons contained two denials (October 1, 1842). One of 
these is "to show that Dr. J. C. Bennett's 'secret-wife system' is 
a creature of his own make, as we know of no such society in 



70 MORMONISM. 

this place, nor ever did." The other was "to show that J. C. 
Bennett's 'secret-wife system' is a disclosure of his own make." 
From these it might be inferred that there was no polygamy in 
Nauvoo were it not for another witness quoted by President 
Smith, of the Reorganization. Cyrus H. Wheelock said: "Jo- 
seph Smith said in 1844, when he was denouncing the John C. 
Bennett secret-wife system, that there was no such system, as 
that introduced or practiced by John C. Bennett, taught or prac- 
ticed in the church, and that the teaching and practicing of it 
would take the people who practiced it to hell." The two denials 
of 1842 and Smith's utterance in 1844 make it very clear that 
there was polygamy introduced and practiced by John C. Ben- 
nett. This the Utah church constantly affirms, but they claim 
that Smith's polygamy came later by divine warrant and was 
an altogether different thing. The Reorganization admit that 
Bennett practiced polygamy in Nauvoo and deny that Smith ever 
did. Was it possible for a man holding the highest offices in the 
city, a member of the First Presidency of the church and a most 
conspicuous figure in every way, to introduce such a thing with- 
out Smith's knowledge and consent? Why did the Lord allow 
Bennett to trick Him into accepting his works? Is it not remark- 
able that Bennett revealed his secret-wife system himself? Why 
did not the prophet expose him in a revelation instead of indors- 
ing him? The Utah Mormons say that the right kind of polyg- 
amy was introduced a year later. v The Reorganization are very 
reluctant to admit that any kind ever got into the church. Let 
us hear another of their witnesses. William Marks said in 1859 : 
"He (Smith) said it would eventually prove the overthrow of 
the church, and we should be obliged to leave the United States 
unless it could be speedily put down." It was certainly in the 
church with a vengeance. "He was satisfied that it was a cursed 
doctrine, and that there must be every exertion made to put it 
down." Let us note that this is polygamy, a system of having 
more wives than one, held as a doctrine in the church and threat- 
ening its overthrow. Who was the doctrinal head of the church, 
the only one authorized to receive revelations? Who was looked 
upon as its prophet by every member in it? "He said that he 
would go before the congregation and proclaim against it, and I 
must go into the High Council, and he would prefer charges 
against those in transgression, and I must sever them from the 
church unless they made ample satisfaction." Why did Joseph 
Smith, "the prophet, seer, translator and revelator to this church," 
allow matters to come to so desperate a pass? But how about 
taking the matter to the High Council? It had already been 
there, as William Marks well knew. Austin Cowles, a member 
of that body, swore to the following May 4, 1844, but a few weeks 
before trn prophet's assassination: "In the latter part of the 
summer, 1843, the patriarch, Hyrum Smith, did, in the High 
Council, of which I was a member, introduce what he said was 
a revelation given through the prophet; that the said Hyrum 



MORMONISM. 71 

Smith did essay to read the said revelation in the said Council; 
that according to his reading there was contained the following 
doctrines : 1. The sealing up of persons to eternal life, against 
all sins, save that of shedding innocent blood, or consenting 
thereto. 2. The doctrine of a plurality of wives, or marrying 
virgins; that 'David and Solomon had many wives, yet in this 
thing they sinned not, save in the matter of Uriah.' This reve- 
lation, with other evidence that the aforesaid heresies were 
atught and practiced in the church, determined me to leave the 
office of first counselor to the president of the church at Nauvoo 
(Marks), inasmuch as I dared not teach or administer such 
laws." 

D. H. Bays, for twenty-eight years a minister of the Reorgan- 
ization, states in his "Doctrines and Dogmas of Mormonism" 
that he knew "Father Cowles" in 1865, "and he assured me that 
polygamy was the fatal rock on which Mormonism was wrecked, 
and that he knew that Joseph and Hyrum were both mixed up 
in it." In a controversy between President Smith, of Lamoni, 
and Elder Littlefield, of Utah, the president challenged the elder 
to give the names of parties who were present at this meeting of 
the High Council and heard the revelation read. Mr. Littlefield 
presented the statements of David Fullmer and Thomas Grover, 
both members of the Utah church. Fullmer gives the date of 
the meeting as on or about the 12th day of August, 1843, and 
identifies the revelation published in the Deseret News extra of 
September 14, 1852, as a true copy of the same. Grover con- 
cludes his statement with : "From that time forward we often 
received instructions from the prophet as to what was the will 
of the Lord and how to proceed." Leonard Soby, a member of 
the High Council who had rejected the revelation and apostatized, 
was living in New Jersey in 1883. President Smith, of the Re- 
organized church, sent to Mr. Soby to secure his affidavit that 
he did not hear the revelation read. Mr. Soby told the messen- 
ger: "If you will draw up an affidavit setting forth that I was 
there and did hear the revelation, I will sign it for you." He 
did sign the latter kind of a document and Mr. Gurley, the mes- 
senger, apostatized from the Reorganized church. The affidavit 
in full appears in Mr. Bays' book. Two members of the Council 
who accepted the doctrine heard the revelation; two members 
who apostatized on account of the doctrine heard it. The testi- 
mony is sufficient and there can be no charge of bias. 

How are we to harmonize this evidence and the denials? 
We do not need to do that. One of the early witnesses against 
the prophet will do it. The Nauvoo Expositor, issued June 7, 
1844, will tell all we want to know. This paper was published by 
some prominent Mormons who fell out with Smith over polyg- 
amy. It says: "They (foreign females) meet him (Joseph) 
expecting a blessing and to learn the will of the Lord concerning 
them, when instead they are told, after having been sworn to 
secrecy in the most solemn manner, with a penalty of death 



n MORMONISM. 

attached, that God Almighty has revealed it to him that she 
should be his (Joseph's spiritual wife, for it was right anciently, 
and God will tolerate it again; but we must keep those pleasures 
and blessings from the world, for until there is a change in the 
government we will endanger ourselves by practicing it — if we 
do not expose ourselves to the law of the land," which was mon- 
ogamic, as President Smith informs us. 

To throw further light on the subject let us examine another 
important witness. On April 30, 1879, the president subjected 
his mother to a very careful examination. She was then nearly 
seventy-five years of age, yet her answers are clear and to the 
point. He asked: "What about the revelation on polygamy? 
Did Joseph Smith have anything like it? What of spiritual 
wifery?" "There was no revelation on either polygamy or spir- 
itual wives. There were some rumors of something of that sort, 
of which I asked my husband. He assured me that all there 
z^as of it was that, in a chat about plural wives, he had said, 
'Well, such a system might possibly be, if everybody was agreed 
to it and would behave as they should, but they would not, and, 
besides, it was contrary to the will of heaven.' " 

From this statement the following facts appear : 

1. There were rumors of polygamy and spiritual wifery 
afloat in the prophet's lifetime. 

2. These caused Emma, his wife, so much anxiety that she 
asked him for an explanation. 

3. They did not originate in the lying of his enemies, as 
some would have us suppose. 

4. Nor did they originate in the wicked mind of John C. 
Bennett. 

5. "All there was of it" came from a harmless little chat, 
between Joseph and some of the "elders" likely. 

6. The highly interesting subject of this "chat" was plural 
wives ! 

7. Joseph himself started the rumor by saying such a system 
might be possible, if everybody was agreed to it and zvould bc- 
liave themselves as they should. Just what kind of conduct would 
constitute proper behavior he does not say. Perhaps he was 
thinking mighty hard then about keeping it from the world. 
This statement of Mrs. Smith is one of the most remarkable in 
existence and confirms many of the charges against Smith. The 
president accuses his opponents of trying to impeach it. Such a 
thing would be folly. It is not necessary to suppose she mis- 
represented the "facts as she saw them. She was gullible enough 
to let Joseph tell her anything he wished. Strange that she was 
unable to see that ordinary men do not chat familiarly over the 
possibility of what they consider cursed doctrines and contrary 
to the will of heaven. But the prophet was an extraordinary 
man ! 

The claim has been made that many of the men who were 
prominent in the Reorganization movement in i860 believed the 



MORMONISM. 73 

prophet to be the author of the disputed revelation. But Presi- 
dent Smith will not allow us to quote his paper. If we do so we 
misrepresent the church. Especially is this the case of all who 
quote Isaac Sheen. Perhaps we can find some one to quote for 
us whom the president will accept. In the interview of April 
30, 1879, above referred to, he asked his mother, "What do you 
think of David Whitmer?" She replied: "David Whitmer I 
believe to be an honest and truthful man. I think what he states 
can be relied on." Certainly ! He is one of the three witnesses 
to the Book of Mormon, and to impeach him would destroy the 
whole Mormon edifice. Let us hear what he has to say about 
the Reorganization in i860: "I have evidence regarding this 
revelation that is recorded in Volume I, No. 1, Latter-Day Saints' 
Herald, being evidence from your own side which you are bound 
to accept. It is the evidence of some of the leaders in the Reor- 
ganization in the beginning, some of whom were with Brother 
Joseph in Nauvoo up to the time of his death." "This number 
of the Herald is very scarce now ; they have been hid away and 
destroyed. I see that when the Reorganized church was estab- 
lished the fact that Joseph received this revelation was then 
known and acknowledged in editorials in the Herald. The rea- 
son why these articles were written in the Herald was to explain 
why the Reorganized church rejected the revelation received by 
Brother Joseph on polvgamy, and to explain that he repented of 
his connection with polygamy just previous to his death." "The 
leaders of the Reorganized church, after a time, began to sup- 
press their opinions concerning this matter. They would answer 
the question, when asked about it, 'I do not know whether Joseph 
received the revelation or not.' This was a truthful, but evasive 
answer, as it was not a matter of knowledge except with a few." 
"I quote from Volume I, No. 1, of The True Latter-Day 
Saints' Herald, page 24, from an article written by Isaac Sheen, 
who was a leader in establishing the Reorganization : 'The Salt 
Lake apostles also excuse themselves by saying that Joseph 
Smith taught the spiritual-wife doctrine, but this excuse is as 
weak as their excuse concerning the ancient kings and patri- 
archs. Joseph Smith repented of his connection with this doc- 
trine and said it zcas of the devil. He caused the revelation on 
that subject to be burned, and when he voluntarily came to Nau- 
voo and resigned himself into the hands of his enemies he said 
that he was going to Carthage to die. At the same time he also 
said that, */ it had not been for that accursed spiritual-zvife doc- 
trine, he would not have come to that. By his conduct at that 
time he proved the sincerity of his repentance and of his pro- 
fession as a prophet. If Abraham and Jacob by repentance can 
obtain salvation and exaltation, so can Joseph Smith.'" David 
Whitmer, a man "whose word can be relied on," yea, zvhose word 
must be relied on, for he is one of the three witnesses to the 
Book of Mormon, quotes Isaac Sheen to the same effect as does 
the "dishonest" party, who "misrepresents" the Reorganized 



74 MORMONISM. 

church. It is hard, indeed, to tell the friends of Mormonism 
from its foes. 

But we are not done with Whitmer. He says: "I will now 
quote from the same number of the Herald, page 8. It is an edi- 
torial, being the second article in the first number of the paper. 
'This adulterous spirit (polygamy) had captivated their hearts, 
and they desired a license from God to lead away captive the fair 
daughters of his people, and in this state of mind they came to 
the prophet Joseph (not Brigham Young). Could the Lord do 
anything more or less than what Ezekiel had prophesied (answer 
a prophet according to his iniquity) ? The Lord hath declared 
by Ezekiel what kind of an answer He would give them, there- 
fore He answered them according to the multitude of their idols 
(giving them an answer through Joseph — the revelation on 
polygamy; and Joseph gave the revelation to them — the church). 
Paul had also prophesied that for this cause God shall send them 
a strong delusion, that they shall believe a lie ; that they all 
might be damned who believe not the truth, but had pleasure in 
unrighteousness. Both these prophecies agree. In Ezekiel's 
prophecy the Lord also says : "I will set my face against that 
man, and will make him a sign and a proverb, and I will cut him 
off from the midst of my people ; and ye shall know that I am the 
Lord. And if the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a 
thing, I, the Lord, have deceived that prophet (or allowed the 
prophet to be deceived because of his iniquity. — W.), and I will 
stretch out my hand upon him, and will destroy him from the 
midst of my people Israel. And they shall bear the punishment 
of their iniquity ; the punishment of the prophet shall be even as 
the punishment of him that seeketh unto him; that the house of 
Israel may go no more astray from me, neither be polluted any 
more with all their transgressions; but that they may be my 
people, and I may be their God, saith the Lord God." We have 
here the facts that have transpired, and as they will continue to 
transpire concerning this subject. The death of the prophet is 
one fact that has been realized, although he abhorred and re- 
pented of this iniquity before his death/" So quotes David 
Whitmer, an "honest and truthful man." He calls attention to 
the fact, overlooked by President Smith, that the time when 
William Marks declares that the prophet called polygamy an 
"accursed" doctrine was just prior to his death and after his 
repentance. He was not repenting of Bennett's system, but his 
own. 

Another question arises, however, and demands an answer. 
Was there polygamy in the church before 1842? While unable 
to quote through the medium of a witness to the Book of Mor- 
mon, we have probably made good the right to appeal to the 
Saints' Herald. This time the appeal is to Volume II, No. 1, 
which contains the following : "As early as March, 1833, this 
state of things was foretold and the saints were cautioned against 
treating lightly the revelations of God. * * * There were 



MORMONISM. 75 

many, very many, who treated lightly the sacred oracles which 
were given unto them. They treated lightly the solemn warn- 
ings in the Book of Mormon against polygamy, and the strict 
commandments in the Book of Covenants against that evil." 
The subject of the article in which the above appears is "The 
Rejection of the Church which was Organized April 30th, 1830." 
President Smith makes much of a ''certified statement of belief" 
adopted by the church in 1835. This sets forth the belief of the 
church on marriage. In the concluding section is the following : 
"Inasmuch as this Church of Christ has been reproached with 
the crime of fornication and polygamy, we declare that one man 
should have one wife, and one woman but one husband, except 
in case of death, when either is at liberty to marry again." Cer- 
tainly a remarkable thing that this church should have been 
reproached with fornication and polygamy. We are not told 
that certain members are reproached. If a few private individ- 
uals had been charged, the statement would not have defended 
the whole church. When Bennett published his book in 1842 he 
told us about some things that had been said of the prophet in 
Kirtland that furnishes the solution to this defense of the church. 
He was accused of improper conduct with Fanny Alyer. Ac- 
cording to one affidavit, Martin Harris, another of the three 
witnesses, said the prophet "was noted for lying and licentious- 
ness." We have from other sources that Oliver Cowderly, the 
third witness, was turned out of the church for accusing Smith 
of adultery during the Missouri troubles. The testimony of the 
three witnesses should convince any Mormon that Smith was a 
practical polygamist many years before the revelation. Orson 
Pratt says the "principle" was revealed to him as early as 1831. 
There is but a very short step from the "principle" in 1831 to 
the practice, and Joseph took it soon enough for "this Church of 
Christ" to feel the effects of it in 1835. 

Another contention of the president is that Joseph never was 
compelled to answer before the courts for polygamy. It was not 
a part of the charge at the time of his death. One does not 
expect his own dog to bite him. He controlled the Nauvoo 
courts absolutely, as the proceedings just before his death showed. 
The Nauvoo Expositor, issued twenty days before his death, 
said that its ground of complaint was his "whoredoms." Smith 
wrecked the Expositor office, and this led to the Carthage trag- 
edy. Marks affirms that he charged his death to that cursed 
spiritual-wife doctrine. We can come to but one conclusion : The 
founder of the Mormon church was a polygamist. The "princi- 
ple" was born with him and "revealed'' every time he cast his 
prophetic eye on a woman. He was so much its slave that we 
are sometimes led to think that his conduct was probably the 
result of disease rather than wilful desire to do wrong. He was 
a degenerate. 

DOES THE BOOK OP MORMON CONTRADICT THE BIBLE? 

According to the orthodox narrative, the angel Moroni told 



76 MORMONISM. 

Joseph Smith that God had a work for him to do. This was to 
translate and publish a book containing the "fulness of the ever- 
lasting gospel." This phrase lies at the very heart of the Mor- 
mon contention. It cannot be denied that the Book of Mormon 
contains additions and amendments to the gospel. If the Bible is 
perfect, as a presentation of the way, there is no need of another 
book. Fully appreciating this, Orson Pratt shows at great length 
the many instances in which the Scriptures fail. In all of these, 
it is needless to say, the Book of Mormon is without a flaw. 
Works, page 189, chapter on "The Bible and Tradition, Without 
Further Revelation, an Insufficient Guide." He also uses the stock 
infidel arguments of his time in assailing the integrity of the 
Scriptures. This at once reveals the fact that there is practically 
an intense antagonism between the two books, in spite of the con- 
tention that they agree doctrinally, prophetically and historically. 
Works, pages 235-6. The real relation between them is even 
more forcibly brought out in the Book of Mormon itself, / Nephi, 
13, in a "prophecy" about the Bible, from which we glean the 
following items : 

(1) The "Gentiles" in America were to have a record "which 
proceedeth out of the mouth of a Jew" (which is false). 

(2) "When it proceedeth out of the mouth of the Jew, it 
contained the plainness of the gospel of the Lord, of whom the 
twelve apostles bare record." 

(3) After it came to the "Gentiles" a "corrupt and abom- 
inable church" "have taken away from the gospel of the Lamb 
many parts which are plain and most precious; and also many 
covenants they have taken away." 

(4) As a result, "an exceeding great many do stumble, yea, 
Satan hath great power over them." 

(5) But God did not "suffer that the Gentiles should forever 
remain in that state of woundedness." 

(6) He "brought forth unto them, in my own power, much 
of my gospel which shall be plain and most precious, saith the 
Lamb." 

Thus did the author of this book set for himself the stu- 
pendous task of amending and amplifying the gospel without 
involving himself in the contradictions which even the sanest 
mind might fear. He found a point of contact with the Bible 
upon which he hoped to base his success, and which he so foully 
aspersed, in the reign of Zedekiah, when the southern kingdom 
was tottering to its fall. Nothing could have been more delusive 
than the sense of security with which the ignorant man selected 
this period rather than one in which Old Testament materials 
were scantier. He was compelled to invent many facts to dove- 
tail the two narratives. He made the central figure of the period 
one Lehi, who left Jerusalem in Zedekiah's first year. This illus- 
trious prophet was a descendant of Joseph, the patriarch hero of 
the Hebrews (I Nephi 5:14), of the tribe of Manasseh (Alma 
10:3). "and had dwelt in Jerusalem in all his days" (1:4)- His 



MORMONISM. 77 

language "consisted of the learning of the Jews, and the lan- 
guage of the Egyptians" (1:2). According to the Bible, the tribe 
of Manasseh spoke the Hebrew. This was the language of Jeru- 
salem as well, so that on these two counts we must register the 
first contradiction of the Bible narrative. 

m We are next informed that in the first year of Zedekiah's 
reign "there came many prophets, prophesying unto the people 
that they must repent, or the great city of Jerusalem must be 
destroyed" (1:4). The historical matter of the Old Testament 
shows this to be false. Jeremiah (27:14. seq.) warns Zedekiah 
and the priests and people in the following words : "And harken 
not to the words of the prophets that speak unto you, saying, 
Ye shall not serve the King of Babylon ; for they prophesy a lie 
unto you. For I have not sent them, saith Jehovah, but they 
prophesy falsely in my name ; that I might drive them out, and 
that ye might perish, ye, and the prophets that prophesy unto 
you. Also I spake unto the priests and to all this people, saying, 
Thus saith Jehovah : Hearken not to the words of your prophets 
that prophesy unto you, saying, Behold, the vessels of Jehovah's 
house shall now shortly be brought again from Babylon ; for they 
prophesy a lie unto you." According to Nephi, Jeremiah puts 
the many prophets on the wrong side. He did not understand 
the "fulness of the gospel." All through the writings of Jere- 
miah he fights the battles of Jehovah alone, not even recognizing 
the aid of the extraordinary Lehi, whose achievements far out- 
shone his own. Consult Jeremiah 20:7 seq. ; 5:30-1; 6:13; 8:8- 
II* 13:13; 14:13-14; 18:18; 26:7-8, and 23:9-16, which, accord- 
ing to most authorities, belongs to Zedekiah's reign. / Nephi 
5:13 says that Lehi and Nephi carried away from Jerusalem 
"many prophecies which had been spoken by the mouth of Jere- 
miah." The above prophecies were unfortunately overlooked in 
the hurried theft of the brass plates. Nephi, cap. 4. 

Another added fact of deep significance appears from the fol- 
lowing passages : "For, behold, Laban hath the record of the 
Jews, and also a genealogy of my forefathers, and they are en- 
graven on plates of brass" / Nephi 3:3. "And Laban also was a 
descendant of Joseph, wherefore he and his fathers kept the 
records" I Nephi 5:16. Laban kept the Jewish records because 
he was a descendant of Joseph. The Jews constituted the South- 
ern Kingdom and the Josephites were of the Northern. The two 
kingdoms were bitterly hostile and widely separated in religion 
from the hour that Jereboam set up golden calves in Bethel and 
Dan till the Northern Kingdom went out in darkness. Now read 
that "Laban also was a descendant of Joseph, wherefore he and 
his fathers had kept the records!" 

These records "did contain the five books of Moses, etc., etc., 
and a record of the Jews from the beginning, even down to the 
commencement of the reign of Zedekiah, King of Judah, and 
also the prophecies of the holy prophets, from the beginning, 



78 MORMONISM. 

etc., etc., and also many prophecies which have been spoken by 
Jeremiah." I Nephi 5:11-13. 

To whom did Moses entrust his books? "And Moses wrote 
this law and delivered it unto the priests the sons of Levi, who 
bare the ark of the covenant of Jehovah, and unto all the elders 
in Israel." Deut. 31:9. In verses 24-26, "when Moses had made 
an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they 
were finished, Moses commanded the Levites, who bare the ark 
of the covenant of Jehovah, saying, Take the Book of the Law, 
and put it by the side of the ark of the covenant of Jehovah your 
God, that it may be there for a witness against thee." In later 
times the Levites were recreant to this trust. Did the descend- 
ants of Joseph then succeed them as the custodians of the law? 
If so, we shall find it in their hands. 

"Hilkiah, the high priest, said unto Shaphan, the scribe, I 
have found the book of the law in the house of Jehovah." 77 
Ki. 22:8. Shaphan read the book to King Josiah, who rent his 
clothes because of the long neglect of the holy writing, and as- 
sembled all Jerusalem to hear it read. As he knew nothing of its 
existence, there is little likelihood that any of Joseph's posterity 
did. Not even the high priest knew of it till it was found exactly 
where Moses told the Levites to place it. The event was but 
twenty-one years before Lehi's departure, when Laban and his 
fathers had kept the records. The contradiction is emphasized 
by the fact that the king, who surpassed all of Judah's kings in 
righteousness (II Ki. 23, 25), and his high priest had not even a 
copy of Deuteronomy, while Laban had the whole Old Testament 
to 600 B. C. ! No authority, past or present, makes the Old Tes- 
tament records accessible at that time. 

But Lehi, of the tribe of Manasseh (Alma 3:10), had an in- 
heritance in Jerusalem. (I Nephi 1:4; 2:1-4; 3:16.) From 
Joshua 17 we learn that Manasseh had no inheritance in Jeru- 
salem. From Numbers 36:9 we learn that no inheritance could 
pass from one tribe to another. Jerusalem was in Judah. An- 
other objection is that Lehi did not know his lineage till Nephi 
stole the records. (Nephi 5:4.) Joshua 14 and following shows 
that every Hebrew inheritance depended on tribal relation. How 
could one have an inheritance without knowing his tribe? If it 
be answered that perhaps an inheritance in the ancient Manasseh 
is meant, we reply, first, that the record positively says Jerusalem, 
and, again, that the Northern Kingdom had been torn up, root 
and branch, and transported to Mesopotamia. 

Very many added facts might be adduced to show the in- 
accuracy of the book, but these are sufficient to demonstrate its 
absolute failure to sustain its historical character at the chosen 
point of contact with the Bible; the great eminence, so to speak, 
from which its wonderful priests and prophets were launched 
upon a marvelous flight of fancy. 

"There are many things engraven on the plates of Nephi 
which do throw greater views upon my gospel." (Doc. and Cov. 



MORMONISM. 79 

10:45, Brighamite.) This idea permeates the whole volume. Per- 
haps, after a study of the "fulness of the gospel," the reader may 
be able "to feel these swelling motions" (Alma 32:28) and "know 
that the word hath swelled his soul" (Alma 32:34). 

From / Nephi 10:17 we learn that "Lehi spake by the power 
of the Holy Ghost, which power he received by faith on the Son 
of God (600 B. C.) ; that the Holy Ghost was the gift of God 
unto all who diligently seek, as well in times of old as in times 
that he should manifest himself unto the children of men; he that 
diligently seeketh shall find, and the mysteries of God shall be 
unfolded to them by the power of the Holv Ghost, as well in 
these times (600 B. C.) as in times of old, and as well in times 
of old as in times to come." 

These "views" are indeed startling. Yet they are scarcely 
a hint of still greater "views" to follow. Faith in the Son of 
God 600 years before He came to earth was commonplace. The 
gift of the Holy Ghost and Bible mysteries were too ordinary to 
excite remark. Lehi, blessing Jacob 575 B. C, said : "And thou 
hast beheld in thy youth His (Christ's) glory; wherefore thou 
art blessed even as they unto whom He shall minister in the 
flesh." II Nephi 2:4. 

Jacob becomes a great prophet and writes as follows (545 B. 
C.) : "For, for this intent, we have written these things, that 
they may know that we knew of Christ, and had a hope of His 
glory many hundred years before His coming, and not only our- 
selves had a hope of His glory, but «also all the holy prophets 
which were before us. (Old Testament prophets, of course.) 
Behold, they believed in Christ, and worshipped the Father in 
His name. (Jacob 4'4~5-) 

"Wherefore, we search the prophets, and we have many reve- 
lations and the spirit of prophecy ; and having all these witnesses, 
we obtain a hope, and our faith (in Christ) becometh unshaken, 
insomuch that we can truly command in the name of Jesus (545 
B. C), and the very trees(l) obey us, or the mountains, or the 
waves of the sea." (Jacob 4:6.) 

"Wherefore, beloved brethren, be reconciled unto Him 
through the atonement of Christ (545 B. C), His only begotten 
Son, and ye may obtain a resurrection, according to the power 
of the resurrection, which is in Christ, and be presented as the 
first fruits of Christ unto God, having faith, and obtained a good 
hope of glory in Him before He manifesteth Himself in the flesh. 
And now, behold, marvel not that I tell you these things; for 
why not speak of the atonement of Christ, and attain to a perfect 
knowledge of Him, as to attain to a perfect knowledge of the 
resurrection and the world to come?" (Jacob 4:12.) 

"But behold, we are not witnesses alone in these things; for 
God also spake them unto prophets of old." (Ibid v. 13.) 

Returning to Nephi, he throws another "view" on the "ful- 
ness of the gospel" in, "Wherefore, my beloved brethren, I know 
that if you shall follow the don (570 years before He did any- 



80 MORMONISM. 

thing to follow), with full purpose of heart, acting no hypocrisy 

and no deception before God, but with real intent, repenting of 

| your sins, witnessing unto the Father, that you are willing to 

I take on you the name of Christ by baptism; yea, by following 
your Lord and Savior down into the water, according to His 
word (as yet unspoken) ; thou shalt receive the Holy Ghost." 
(II Nephi 3i:i3-) 

So perfectly had Nephi revealed the mysteries that he says 
(II Nephi 32:6): "Behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and 
there will be no more doctrine given until after He shall mani- 
fest Himself in the flesh." Jarom, in explaining why he writes 
so little, about 400 B. C, says : "For what could I write more 
than my fathers have written? For have they not revealed the 
plan of Salvation? I say unto you, Yea; and this sufficeth 
me." (1:2.) 

So complete was this revelation that King Benjamin, 124 B. 
C, anticipates the saving of the Gentiles in the following : "And 
the Lord God hath sent His holy prophets among all the children 
of men, to declare these things (coming of Christ ; incarnation ; 
miracles; teaching; suffering; name; mother's name, Mary; 
crucifixion; resurrection; judgment; atonement; salvation 
through repentance and faith) to every kindred, nation, and 
tongue, that thereby whosoever should believe that Christ should 
come, the same might receive remission of their sins and rejoice 
with exceeding great joy, even as though He had already come 
among them." (Mosiah 3:13.) 

Alma, cap. 32:16, says: "Blessed is he that believeth in the 
word of God, and is baptized without stubbornness of heart ; yea, 
without being brought to know the word, or even compelled to 
know, before they will believe." 

From Alma 46 we learn that there were churches of Christ 
and Christians in J2 B. C. 

To crown these "views v with a fitting diadem, it is necessary 
to go back to 2,000 B. C. (Book of Mormon). There we shall 
make the acquaintance of Jared's brother, a nameless prophet of 
extraordinary achievements. 

We are told that "there never was greater things made mani- 
fest than that which was made manifest unto the brother of 
Jared." (Ether 4:4.) 

That this is no more than truth appears from Ether 3:19: 
"And because of the knowledge of this man, he could not be 
kept from beholding within the vail." In 3:26 it is plainly 
asserted that "the Lord could not withhold anything from him," 
and in 12:21 to this declaration is added an equally positive one: 
"Wherefore, He (the Lord) showed him all things, for he could 
not be kept without the vail." Ether 12:19 further asserts: 
"And there were many whose faith was so exceeding strong, 
even before Christ came, which could not be kept from within 
the vail, but they truly saw with their eyes the things which they 
had beheld with an eye of faith, and they were glad." 



MORMONISM. 81 

This furnishes us a remarkable series of "greater views" 
capable of comparison with the teachings of the Scriptures. 

A passage immediately suggested by the foregoing is found 
in the first chapter of Hebrews. It reveals an essential differ- 
ence between the "old time" and "these days" that the Book of 
Mormon knows nothing about. "God having of old time spoken 
unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers 
manners hath at the end of these days spoken to us in his Son." 
(Heb. i: 1-2.) The same thought is expressed in 9:26: "But now 
once at the end of the ages hath He been manifested to put away 
sin by the sacrifice of Himself." The Book of Mormon knew 
too much about that which was once manifested, now, at the end 
of the ages, "before He manifested Himself in the flesh." He 
"was manifested at the end of the times for your sake." (I Peter 
1:20.) This thought receives added emphasis from the language 
of Romans 16:25-6: "Now, to him that is able to establish you 
according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, ac- 
cording to the revelation of the mystery which hath been kept in 
silence through times eternal, but now is manifested, and through 
the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment 
of the eternal God, is made known unto all the nations unto 
obedience of faith" Here the preaching of Christ is a mystery 
kept in silence through times eternal. The passage has a different 
ring from the Book of Mormon. Jesus Himself gave forth an 
utterance that should be placed alongside of the teachings of 
Nephi and others. Matthew 13:17: "Many prophets and wise 
men desired to see the things which ye see, and saw them not ; 
and to hear the things which ye hear, and heard them not." He 
then interprets the parable of the sower, in spite of the fact that 
no "Nephite" would have prefaced the interpretation of a para- 
ble on preaching the gospel as Jesus did. Jesus had unfortunately 
forgotten Jared's brother and many others. We read again in 
Bphesians 3:5 that "in other generations it was not made known 
unto the sons of men, as it hath now been revealed unto His 
holy apostles and prophets." The acceptance of the Gentiles is 
the mystery of this verse, and we readily see its connection with 
Romans 16:26. But in verse 8 Paul continues: "Unto me, * * * 
was this grace given, to preach unto the Gentiles the unsearch- 
able riches of Christ, and to make all men see what is the dis- 
pensation (a. v. fellowship) of the mystery which in all ages 
hath been hid in God." This is pretty hard on the prophet 
whom God showed all things, because he could not be kept from 
within the vail. It also convicts King Benjamin or Paul of a 
falsehood as to preaching to Gentiles. (See Mosiah 3:13.) Paul 
did not have Joseph Smith's "fulness of the gospel." But in spite 
of this disability he continues to discuss the "mystery" in Colos- 
sians 2:26. He insists that "it hath now been manifested to His 
saints, to whom God was pleased to make known what is the 
riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is 
Christ in you (Gentile Christians), the hope of glory." Here is 



82 MORMONISM. 

a "hope of glory" that the Nephite prophets failed to get. The 
Book of Mormon is as full on the subject of the Gentiles as the 
New Testament, although there was not one of them on the 
western continent. The strangest thing of all is that Paul imag- 
ined that he was the first missionary to the Gentiles. In 76 B. C, 
as well as earlier, the Book of Mormon says, "the Lord doth 
grant unto all nations, of their own nation and tongue, to teach 
His word." (Alma 29:8.) 

Again, Jesus was not enlightened, for He was not sent but 
unto the lost sheep of the House of Israel. (Matth. 15:34.) 
When Peter baptized Cornelius there was great excitement in 
the church. He had not expected to baptize the noble Gentile 
until led to do so by a miracle. 

In the Bible there is no gift of the Spirit, or baptism of the 
Spirit, till Pentecost. John had promised it (Matth. 3:11), and 
in Christ's personal ministry the Spirit is referred to as the one 
which they that believed on Him were to receive, for the Spirit 
was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. (John 
7:39.) The Spirit was not given in Asia before Christ came, 
because He was not yet glorified. The same reason would hold 
good for America. Jesus promises the Spirit to His disciples in 
His closing address, saying: "It is expedient for you that I go 
away : for if I go not away the Comforter will not come unto 
you; but if I go, I will send Him unto you." (John 16:7.) But 
over in America men saw Christ's glory before He was glorified, 
and had the gift and baptism of the Spirit long before Jesus 
went away and sent Him unto the church. In 77 B. C. Alma 
"clapped his hands on them," and "they were filled with the 
Spirit." By the side of the churches and Christians existing at 
that time we place Christ's promise in Matthew 16:18: "Upon 
this rock I will build my church," — future; and the statement of 
Acts 11:26: "The disciples were called Christians first in Anti- 
och." Finally, we have / Peter 1:10-12, which says: "Concern- 
ing which salvation the prophets sought and searched diligently, 
who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you ; search- 
ing what time, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ that 
was in them did point unto, when it testified beforehand the suf- 
ferings of Christ, and the glories that should follow them. (Book 
of Mormon prophets knew all about His sufferings, and some of 
them saw His glory. They knew He was to come just 600 years 
from Lehi's departure from Jerusalem. / Nephi 19:8.) To 
whom it was revealed that not unto themselves, but unto you. 
did they minister these things, which now have been announced 
unto you through them that preached the gospel unto you by the 
Holy Spirit sent down from heaven." It is strange that Peter 
did not know that "they attained to a perfect knowledge of Him," 
and even the Gentiles were "rejoicing with exceeding joy, even 
as though He had already come among them." 

Isaiah 29 is claimed as "the Mormon chapter," and the elders 
make a strong point of its exposition. It is found in the Book 



MORMONISM. 83 

of Mormon. (II Nephi 26:15-18, and 27:2-35 .) It will throw 
great light on their "exposition" to compare the two versions. 
It is needless to say that the Mormon version contains "many- 
plain and most precious" things that are entirely unknown to the 
Bible. It may add to the interest of the reader to know that in 
Joseph Smith's Inspired Translation of the Holy Scriptures, pub- 
/ished by the Reorganized church, the improvements found in 
the Book of Mormon are nearly all incorporated. Ariel of the 
first verse (Bible) is expressly declared to be the city where 
David dwelt, and the whole chapter applies to Jerusalem. II 
Nephi 26:15-18 very skillfully beheads the chapter, and furnishes 
it with an entirely new introduction. Our artist was unable to 
transfer this to the Inspired Translation : "But, behold, I 
prophesy unto you concerning the last days, concerning the days 
when God shall bring these things forth unto the children of 
men. After that my seed, and the seed of my brethren, shall 
have dwindled in unbelief and have been smitten by the Gen- 
tiles." To this is appended a mutilated version of verses 2-5, in 
which is a declaration that these things shall be written and 
sealed up in a book. In their exposition the elders can behead 
the chapter, put it in the Nephite setting, and open the sealed 
book with miraculous skill. In fact, this is about the only mir- 
acle you can ever get their "apostles" to perform. While verses 
6 to jo are not greatly altered in either the Book of Mormon or 
the Inspired Translation, the most careful search will not reveal 
the whereabouts of verses 11 and 12. If the elders had their 
way these verses, as they stand in our Bible, would be found 
neither in heaven above nor in earth below, and in the place to 
which they would consign them even "brass plates" would melt. 
"And the vision of all is become unto you as the words of a 
book that is sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, 
saying, Read this, I pray thee : and he saith, I cannot, for it is 
sealed. And the book is delivered to him that is not learned, 
saying, Read this, I pray thee : and he saith, I am not learned." 
(Bible.) 

In II Nephi 27:6-25 a long substitution for the above is intro- 
duced by, "And it shall come to pass that the Lord God shall 
bring forth unto you the words of a book, and they shall be the 
words of them which have slumbered. And, behold, the book 
shall be sealed ; and in the book shall be a revelation from God 
from the beginning of the world to the end thereof." It is evi- 
dent that we are now close to "the fulness of the gospel." Verse 
9 continues : "But the book shall be delivered unto a man, and 
he shall deliver the words of the book which are the words of 
they which have slumbered in the dust ; and he shall deliver 
these words unto another ; but the words which are sealed he 
shall not deliver, neither shall he deliver the book." In the fol- 
lowing section we find that the book shall be kept unto the own 
due time of the Lord ; that it shall be read from the housetops 
by the power of Christ; that none shall behold it save three wit- 



84 MORMONISM. 

nesses and a few others; and that they shall testify to its truth 
and the things therein." Such "plainness" would be very aston- 
ishing to Isaiah, even if it is "most precious" to the Mormon 
elders. Verse 15 continues : "But, behold, it shall come to pass 
that the Lord God shall say unto him to whom he shall deliver 
the book, Take these words which are not sealed and deliver 
them to another, that he may show them unto the learned, say- 
ing. Read this, I pray thee. And the learned shall say, Bring 
hither the book and I will read them; and now, because of the 
glory of the world and to get gain will they say this, and not for 
the glory of God. And the man shall say, / cannot bring the 
book, for it is sealed. Then shall the learned say, I cannot read 
it. Wherefore, it shall come to pass, that the Lord God will 
deliver again the book and the words thereof to him that is not 
learned ; and the man that is not learned shall say, I am not 
learned. Then shall the Lord say unto him, The learned shall 
not read them, for they have rejected them, and I am able to do 
mine own work, wherefore thou shalt read the words which I 
sliall give unto thee." Then follows a lengthy section adding 
more of the fulness of the gospel to the substitute for Isaiah 2Q- 
11-12. As David Whitmer exclaimed, "Great are the mysteries 
of (the Mormon) God!" Let us now notice the following facts 
with reference to the original passage : 

1. The Hebrew original in the phrase "the vision of all" 
expresses totality. Gesenius says that "where it refers to several 
things, many individuals," it means all, every. In harmony with 

this meaning of the word ( col.) neither the learned nor the 

unlearned was able to read. 

2. Isaiah does not say that the book had any actual existence. 
As an illustration of the blindness of both priests and people, he 
supposes a learned man (Heb., one who knows writing) to say, 
"I cannot read it, for it is sealed," and an unlearned man (Heb., 
one who knows not writing) to say, "I cannot read it, for I 
(Heb.) know not writing." 

3. He positively says that in his illustration the book is de- 
livered to both men, and that vision (revelation) is to both of 
them (all) like the words of that book. The Mormon interpola- 
tions hang on the construction of two pronouns. "Which men 
deliver to one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee." 
The obvious antecedent of each is book. While in both the 
Hebrew and English we can determine nothing from the use of 

which ( ), this ( ) is singular in both and must refer 

to book'( ), which is singular, and not to words ( ), 

plural. Of course, the Book of Mormon could not be held to a 
grammatical point like this, but it is safe to rely on it in the Bible. 

These observations serve to bring out' many contradictions 
usually glossed over with great skill by the elders. 

In conclusion, let us observe that many of the "greater views" 
of the Book of Mormon are interpolated in the earlier books of 
the Bible in the Inspired Translation. This may be due to the 



MORMONISM. 85 

fanciful genius of Smith and Rigdon, or it may be due to the 
consciousness that, as the Bible stands, there can be no com- 
promise with the Book of Mormon. Six lines about Enoch in the 
sixth chapter of Genesis are expanded into as many pages, in 
which the ancient patriarch sits at the feet of Joseph Smith and 
learns almost as many things as God showed the brother of 
Jared. The section ends with these remarkable words : "And 
all the days of Zion, in the days of Enoch, were three hundred 
and sixty-five years." "And it came to pass, that Zion was not, 
for God received it up into his own bosom ; and from thence went 
forth the saying, Zion is fled. And all the days of Enoch were 
four hundred and thirty years." (Verses 76 and 78 of the sixth 
chapter of Genesis.) The reader who is interested in knowing 
how much that is "plain and most precious" Joseph added to 
Enoch may compare Gen. 6:21-24, King James' version, with 
Gen. 6:22-79, Inspired Translation. 



In the preparation of this chapter I have used the Reprint of 
the Palmyra Edition of the Book of Mormon, published at Inde- 
pendence, Mo. ; 

The Book of Mormon, Salt Lake City, 1891 ; 

The Book of Mormon, Lamoni, la., 1874; 

Hebrew Bible ; 

The American Revised Version of the Bible ; 

The Authorized Version, on Isaiah 29, 

And Joseph Smith's Inspired Translation. 

John T. Bridwell. 



SPAULDING MANUSCRIPT AGAIN. 

The relatives and friends of Mr. Spaulding are positive in 
their testimony that the copy of the manuscript that was in the 
hands of Mrs. Spaulding is not the same as that now in library 
at Oberlin, Ohio. Both sides present good evidence for the gen- 
uineness of the manuscript. The only way out of the difficulty is 
that there were two manuscripts. Mr. S. perhaps gave the 
printers a rough copy of his manuscript and retained one for 
himself. This copy, in all probability, he enlarged and retained. 

It is quite probable that Joseph Smith saw one of these manu- 
scripts and it gave him some start in preparing the Book of 
Mormon. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE POWER 0E THE MIND. 

Before we investigate the subject of Hypnotism, Spir- 
itualism and the Occults, it is important to give a few 
rules governing the activities of the mind. What won- 
derful things the mind can do ! The mind solves the laws 
of gravitation, marshals worlds into order, clears up the 
sun's spots, mounts upon wings, cuts its way through the 
starry zodiac, and gives us glimpses of worlds beyond. 

The mind can cure or kill, heal or make sick, create 
happiness or produce sorrow. It can reproduce the events 
of a lifetime in a moment. Where is the person who has 
not dreamed a life of events in a few seconds? You go 
to the hotel and ask to be called in time for breakfast. 
The next morning the clerk raps on the door. You give 
a half response. The clerk waits thirty seconds and raps 
again. During this time you dream that you arose, 
dressed, went to the depot, purchased a ticket, boarded 
the train, was injured in a wreck, and carried to your 
home, where loving friends were dressing the wounds. 
A man told me that once he was sinking to the bottom 
of a lake. He thought he was drowning. It was only 
nine feet from the surface to the bottom of the lake. Yet 
in the time it required for him to go to the bottom, only 
a few seconds, he thought of every mean act of his life. 

In Philadelphia, in one of the hotels, several physicians 
have a large room where they are experimenting psycho- 
logically. They arrange, with trigger, iron railings, 
planks and sheets of iron. When a person is sound 
asleep they spring the trigger and all come crashing 
down. Of course, the sleeper is much alarmed, and he 
springs out of bed. They tell him not to be alarmed ; that 
they were only experimenting, and ask him to tell them 
what he thought, A man from Aurora, III, gave this 



THE POWER OF THE MIND, S7 

history: "I thought I came to Philadelphia to cross the 
ocean. I crossed to England, went down the Bonny Blue, 
visited the Catacombs of Rome, returned to Liverpool, 
took the steamer for home ; when four days out we were 
caught in a terrific storm and tossed mercilessly about for 
fourteen days and nights. Finally the cargo was thrown 
over, but the crash came, and we were sinking to the bot- 
tom of the sea when I awoke." All this ran through his 
mind in a few seconds. 

Throughout the ages men have witnessed these won- 
derful powers of the mind, but Dr. T. J. Hudson, of 
Washington, D. C, was the first to give a correct work- 
ing basis in Psychic Phenomena. He tells that there are 
two minds; one he calls the Objective, the other the Sub- 
jective. Other writers call these activities of the 
mind, the Conscious and the Sub-Conscious; the Out- 
ward and the Inner Alan. We prefer to accept the terms 
Subjective and Objective in this discussion. 

The Objective and the Subjective. — The objective 
mind reasons, accepts and rejects, calculates, classifies, 
and takes notice of objects around us. Its medium is the 
five senses. 

The objective faculties are the sentinels of the brain. 
It is their duty to decide what shall enter this temple, the 
brain. These sentinels keep watch at the door of the 
house and decide what must enter therein. If you can 
slip past these sentinels, the objective faculties, and plan 
a suggestion upon the subjective faculties, the suggestion 
will be acted upon. The mind is a house. There are two 
men here (two minds), the outward and the inward man. 
The man on the inside largely rules the house. He be- 
lieves anything you tell him, and tries to do what you ask 
him to do. 

But the man at the door tells the man in the house what 
to do. This sentinel is on the alert. He watches that no 
one passes him and suggests to the man in the house. 
W T hat you have to do to influence the whole man is to 



88 THE POWER OF THE MIND. 

elude the sentinel, pass him and suggest. This is often 
done while the man at the door is awake. But most of 
the time you will have to wait until the sentinel goes to 
sleep (hypnotism), then you can easily pass and enter 
into conversation with the man of the house. 

The subjective mind dominates in sleep, hypnotism, in- 
sanity and mediumship. 

1. The subjective mind is controlled by suggestion. 

2. It has a perfect memory. It never forgets any- 
thing. 

3. It cannot reason inductively. 

4. It is the seat of the emotions. 

5. It knows by intuition. 

6. Telepathy is the power of the subjective mind. 

7. In the subjective mind, many authors say, we are 
to seek for the power to move objects without physical 
touch. 

The objective mind exercises its power best when the 
body is in perfect health and in its normal condition. The 
subjective mind is more active in sickness and insanity. 
A diseased and feeble body constitutes a good psychic. 

As a person approaches dissolution (death) the sub- 
jective faculties become more powerful. It is for this 
reason that persons dying may sing songs and repeat 
poems long forgotten. 

As the subjective mind never forgets, at some time it 
may call up anything that had ever been heard or seen. 
Every word, song, speech or whisper has been planted 
upon the subjective mind. Some time these things may 
be lifted to consciousness. This is especially true in in- 
sanity and in nearing death. 

Not long ago an old lady in an insane asylum was con- 
stantly repeating a Hebrew poem. She was illiterate and 
knew not one letter of Hebrew. The superstitious cried : 
"If this is not a spirit, what is it? I don't know; there- 
fore, it is a spirit. Some supernatural power controls 
her." In the middle ages she would have been burned as 



THE POWER OF THE MIND. 89 

a witch. But a physician started to find a solution of this 
phenomenon. He found that in her girlhood she had lived 
in the home of an old preacher, who was a Hebrew 
scholar. Often in his study he quoted the Hebrew poem. 
This servant girl heard him. It made no impression upon 
her objectively, but subjectively the poem was printed 
upon her mind. In the home of the daughter of this old 
preacher the poem was found. The insane woman no 
time in her sane moments could have quoted one line, 
but in her crazy moments she used every word. 

When the objective faculties are dormant, the sub- 
jective have full sway. In Cleveland a woman of eighty 
just before death sang an old song. The tune was minor. 
No one in the room had ever heard the tune. She had 
not thought of the song for fifty years. Before she took 
sick she could not have even remembered the name of the 
song. As she sang this plaintive minor silly people said, 
"It is a spirit." But in an old psalter, this song, words 
and music, was found. 

When the subjective controls, the dying Christian sings 
songs and sees angels ; the wicked see demons and ghosts ; 
the drunkard in his tremens sees snakes ; the insane see 
departed friends, and the hypnotized see whatever you 
suggest. The insane have been known to repeat whole 
speeches that they never had committed. A boy of ten 
may read the speech of Patrick Henry. At forty, under 
hypnotic influence, he may repeat the entire speech. In 
religious frenzy the subjective dominates. By songs, 
prayers and frantic appeal seekers after religion become 
entirely subjective. They see angels and hear songs. 
Under these influences some ignorant person begins to 
harangue the audience. All who hear him know he can- 
not make an address. At once people declare he is con- 
verted and the Spirit of God has given him power of 
speech. 

Harmony of the Objective and Subjective. — The 
great orator, preacher, statesman or general is he who 



90 THE POWER OF THE MIND. 

holds both the objective and subjective in perfect har- 
mony. Neither must dominate. If the objective mind 
dominates, the man is cold, slow of action, repellant and 
overcautious. He is void of sympathy, emotion, affection 
and magnetic powers. People shun him. He fails in 
business, for he will not venture. He inspires no ad- 
miration. In oratory he is afraid he will not use the cor- 
rect word in the proper place. He cannot lift himself 
above his environments. Everything always goes wrong 
with him. 

If the subjective .acuities dominate, they will drive a 
man on to destruction. The subjective mind dominates 
entirely in the insane and idiotic. It controls the musical, 
mathematical and oratorical prodigies. Blind Tom, the 
musical prodigy, had no objective mind. He was all sub- 
jective, hence idiotic. He remembered everything. Some 
one would play a piece of music. Blind Tom subjectively 
would repeat it, and miss not a note. The asylums are 
full of persons who let the subjective dominate. 

Reason abdicated. Held in proper bound, the sub- 
jective faculties are valuable beyond calculation. Art, 
music and poetry would be lost if the objective held con- 
trol. But it is dangerous to live too much on the sub- 
jective plane. Great poets, artists and musicians are 
largely subjective. Generally they are eccentric, sensitive 
and impulsive. Lord Macaulay said, "All poets are par- 
tially insane." 

Sir William Hamilton said musicians were men of 
poor judgment. 

Macaulay says : "No man can be a poet or perhaps 
enjoy poetry without a certain unsoundness of mind. By 
poetry we do not mean verse, but the power to create 
vivid imagination." These who dwell long in the sub- 
jective become visionary and weak in moral force. They 
are half crazy. Many persons of the great genius are 
constantly surprising their friends by their strange ac- 
tions. Thev commit indiscretions. They fall into sin 



THE POWER OF THE MIND. 91 

and crime. People ask: "In the name of reason, why 
did they do these things? What reason for it?" There 
is no reason. Reason had gone to sleep. Musicians who 
are constantly under the gaze of people and who are 
drawing upon their subjective faculties in order to be 
brilliant, are easily tempted to commit wrong. The 
woman who has lived for hours in the whirl of gay soci- 
ety, who has been in the realm of the ideal, performing 
for hours upon the piano without thinking of what is 
going on all around her, is in great danger. All her rea- 
soning faculties are dormant. Emotions fill her entire 
being. Under this half-hypnotic condition she is amen- 
able to almost any suggestion. She may be pious, prayer- 
ful and cultured, yet she falls like an angel from heaven 
to hell. Brilliancy often is a dangerous thing. The 
woman in the dizzy dance is largely subjective. It is 
nothing unusual to hear society men scoff some women 
in the dance, because they are too objective. 

The society man often says : "My partner was too ob- 
jective to be interesting." To be objective is simply to 
have some sense. The woman in the dance who uses her 
good sense is too objective to these men. But most per- 
sons in the dance are subjective. They toss reason over- 
board, and become so entirely subjective that they take 
and allow liberties that would not be tolerated elsewhere. 

Happy is the person who can hold all these faculties 
in harmonious equality. 



CHAPTER VII. 

HYPNOTISM. 

The History of Hypnotism. — It is universally ad- 
mitted that some men can influence others. We call this 
influence magnetic, mesmeric or hypnotic power. The 
presence of some people gives pleasure, while the pres- 
ence of others is distasteful. Some people you like on 
first sight, and you cannot tell why. Others you hate. 
This mysterious personal magnetic power has been recog- 
nized in all ages. The ancients attributed this power to 
supernatural agencies. A Greek author said: "If I 
stroke him gently with my hand, I put him to sleep." 
Here, two thousand years ago, we find a hypnotizer. The 
Egyptian priests produced sleep by gazing at objects. 

Hypnotism is nothing more than a form of sleep pro- 
duced by artificial means. There is but little difference 
between the natural and hypnotic sleep. The effect is the 
same, a rest of the body. This hypnotic power existed 
among the Persian Magi. The early Christians in Egypt 
were accustomed to closing their eyes and humming 
chants until they all saw visions. "Angels hovered 
around." This was simply self-hypnotism. The priest 
of the middle ages was in the habit of standing over the 
sick, waving his hands and manipulating the face until his 
subject went to sleep. 

Mohammedans and the dervishes of the East mani- 
fested hypnotic powers and used them for healing pur- 
poses. Mesmer startled the world with his Animal Mag- 
netism. About the end of the eighteenth century he be- 
gan curing disease by the application of the magnet. He 
finally abandon the magnet and became a Mesmerist. 
Nothing very different from modern hypnotism. He 
healed thousands. 

But all this work of the ancients and mediaeval per- 



HYPNOTISM. 93 

formers had no scientific basis. Mystery surrounded the 
entire work. Deleuze, 1815 gave a better explanation. 
He used his personal magnetism largely to cure the sick. 
To his patients he said : 

1. Think of nothing, only that you are getting well. 

2. Look at me steadily. Go to sleep. 

3. All your pain is leaving you. When you wake up 
you will be well. 

In 1841 Dr. Braid, of England, instead of calling this 
power mesmeric or magnetic, named it Hypnotism. He 
gave the first scientific explanation. The mysterious be- 
gan to give way to the scientific. In this country, 1848, 
Dr. Stanley Grimes began to practice mesmerism (now 
hypnotism) and lifted the practice upon a higher plane. 
He did more than any man in this continent to rescue 
hypnotism from the mysterious. 

We owe much to Prof. Bernheim, of Nancy, France. 
He has done much to demonstrate the power of hyp- 
notism in the curing of disease. It is only within the last 
few years that hypnotism has been recognized as worthy 
of scientific investigation. To-day every good physician 
must understand the application of hypnotism to disease. 
Suggestive Therapeutics must be studied by all success- 
ful physicians. 

WHO CAN HYPNOTIZE. 

Any one with ordinary will power can hypnotize. The power 
to hypnotize does not rest in the operator, but in the person to 
be hypnotized. The subject must consent to be hypnotized. 
Restless, nervous, excitable persons do not make good operators. 
They cannot get the confidence of the subject. Remember that 
the power to be hypnotized (as in natural sleep) rests in the 
subject, but the operator may bring about proper condition. This 
foolish notion that only strong-minded men can hypnotize is as 
false as the notion that only weak-minded people can be hypno- 
tized. A man of ordinary intelligence may hypnotize the giant 
intellect of the world. The only thing essential is to get the 
consent of this giant mind. 

WHO CAN BE HYPNOTIZED. 

It is nothing uncommon to hear silly people say: "No one 
can hypnotize me." You can not hypnotize : 



94 HYPNOTISM. 

i. An idiot. 

2. A child that cannot think. 

3. A weak-minded person. 

4. You cannot hypnotize a drunkard or a morphine fiend. 

5. Stubborn and vicious people are hard to hypnotize. 

6. The depraved are difficult to influence. 

The persons who are the most easily hypnotized are : 

1. Strong-minded people who have the power to concentrate 
the mind. 

2. Soldiers and pupils in school are easily hypnotized. They 
are accustomed to obey commands. 

3. Students and teachers who have the power to concentrate 
the mind can be easily influenced. 

4. Sick people, in order to be relieved of pain, readily con- 
sent to hypnotic suggestions. 

It is not much to the credit of a man for him to boast he can- 
not be hypnotized. Imbeciles cannot be hypnotized. Any one of 
ordinary intelligence can be hypnotized if he will surrender him- 
self to the suggestions of the operator. 

The Hindoo and the Spiritualistic Medium hypnotize them- 
selves. 

HOW TO HYPNOTIZE. 

Many methods are now in use. Mesmer made passes over 
the subject until he induced sleep. He in the early part of his 
career believed that there was a magnetic fluid that passed from 
his fingers. This theory is now abandoned. 

The Braid school hypnotized by having the subject gaze at 
some bright object. 

The Nancy school hypnotized largely by suggestion. Mesmer 
made passes. 

The best method, is the combination of these three. 

Before undertaking to hypnotize any person you should learn 
a few things : 

1. Always as a beginner select for your subject a person 
younger than yourself. Others will not have confidence in you, 
and you will feel restless in working with them. 

2. Select one who has been hypnotized or a stranger who is 
willing for you to hypnotize him. 

3.' Your regular companions will likely treat the subject with 
levity. They are not good subjects for you. 

4. Do all things seriously. Permit no disorder or pretending. 

5. Select a time and place where all conditions are favorable. 

6. Begin by securing the confidence of your subject. Let 
him understand that hypnotism is a gentle sleep and that there 
is no danger. Some time to the sick and timid it is better not to 
say anything about hypnotism. Simply have the patient lie down 
on a sofa. Then tell him that you want him to sleep a few min- 
utes. Tell your subject to think of nothing only that he is going 
to sleep. After you have the proper conditions begin by telling 
him that he is going to sleep. ^ Repeat the words slowly : "You 



HYPNOTISM. 95 

are going to sleep. Your eyes are heavy. Go to sleep. Drowsy, 
sleepy ; sleepy, drowsy. Now your eyes are heavy. You cannot 
open them." As you say this put your thumb between the eyes 
and press down on the nerves. The patient will think he cannot 
open his eyes. Here I give the method of Dr. Moll, of Berlin : 

In order to give the reader an idea of the phenomena 
of hypnotism it will be best, first of all, to describe a few 
experiments. The phenomena will in this way be made 
more comprehensible than by means of any number of 
definitions. 

First Experiment. I begin the experiments with a 
young man of twenty. I request him to seat himself on 
a chair, and give him a button to hold, telling him to look 
at it fixedly. After three minutes his eyelids fall ; he tries 
in vain to open his eyes, which are fast closed ; his hand, 
which until now has grasped the button, drops upon his 
knee. I assure him that it is impossible for him to open 
his eyes. (He makes vain efforts to open them.) I now 
say to him, "Your hands are stuck fast to your knee ; you 
cannot possibly raise them." (He raises his hands, how- 
ever.) I continue to converse with him ; I find that he is 
perfectly conscious, and I can discover no essential change 
in him whatever. I raise one of his arms ; directly I let 
go, he drops it as he pleases. Upon which I blow upon 
his eyes, which open at once, and he is in the same state 
as before the experiment. The young man remembers 
all that I have said to him. The only striking thing is, 
therefore, that he could not open his eyes, and that he 
feels a certain degree of fatigue. 

Second Experiment. This is a woman of fifty-three. 
When she has seated herself on a chair I place myself be- 
fore her; I raise my hands, and move them downwards, 
with the palms towards her, from the top of the head to 
about the pit of the stomach. I hold my hands so that 
they may not touch her, at a distance of from two to four 
centimetres. As soon as my hands come to the lowest 
part of the stroke I carry them in a wide sweep with out- 



96 HYPNOTISM. 

spread arms up over the subject's head. I then repeat 
exactly the same movements ; that is, passes from the 
above downwards, close to the body, and continue this for 
about ten minutes. At the end of this time the subject 
is sitting with closed eyes, breathing deeply and peace- 
fully. When I ask her to raise her arms, she raises them 
only slightly ; they then fall down again heavily. 
When I ask her how she feels, she explains that she is 
very tired. I forbid her to open her eyes. (She makes 
useless attempts to open them.) Now 1 lift up her right 
arm; it remains in the air, even after I have let go. I 
command her to drop her arm. (She drops it.) I lift it 
again, and again it remains in the air; upon which I re- 
quest her to drop her arm, declaring at the same time that 
she cannot do it. (She now makes vain efforts to drop 
her arm, but it remains in the air.) The same thing hap- 
pens with the other arm. When I forbid her she is unable 
to drop it; she cannot pronounce her own name directly 
I have assured her that she is dumb. (She only makes 
movements with her mouth, without producing any 
sound.) I tell her that now she can speak. (She speaks 
at once.) I say to her: "You hear music." (The 
woman shakes her head to show that she hears no music.) 
I wake her by passes from below, upwards, over the sur- 
face of her body, turning the back of the hand towards 
her. (She now opens her eyes, and can control all her 
movements.) 

We see here, then, that not only are the eyes closed dur- 
ing hypnosis, but that all sorts of different movements 
become impossible to the subject when I forbid them. 

Third Experiment. This is with a boy of sixteen, whom 
I have hypnotized several times. I request him to look me 
straight in the eyes. After he has done this for some 
time I take him by the hand and draw him along with me. 
Then I let go, but our eyes remain fixed on each other's. 
Then I lift my right arm. (The boy does the same.) I 
raise my left arm. (He does the same.) I make him 



HYPNOTISM. 97 

understand by a gesture that he must kneel down. (He 
does so.) He tries to rise, but does not succeed so long 
as I look at him, and fix him to the floor by a movement of 
the hand. Finally I cease to look at him ; the charm is at 
once broken. 

We see here, then, a young man whose movements take 
the character of imitation, and whose eyes at the same 
time are wide open and fixed upon mine. 

Fourth Experiment. Mr. X., forty-one years old, seats 
himself on a chair. I tell him that he must try to sleep. 
"Think of nothing but that you are to go to sleep." After 
some seconds I continue : "Now your eyelids are be- 
ginning to close ; your eyes are growing more and more 
fatigued ; the lids quiver more and more, r You feel tired 
all over ; your arms go to sleep ; your legs grow tired ; a 
feeling of heaviness and the desire for sleep take pos- 
session of your whole body. Your eyes close ; your head 
feels duller; your thoughts grow more and more con- 
fused. Now you can no longer resist ; now your eyelids 
are closed. Sleep !" After the eyelids are closed I ask 
him if he can open them. (He tries to do so, but they are 
too heavy.) I raise his left arm high in the air. (It re- 
mains in the air, and cannot be brought down in spite 
of all his efforts.) I ask him if he is asleep. "Yes." 
"Fast asleep?" "Yes." "Do you hear the canary sing- 
ing?" "Yes." "Now you hear the concert?" "Cer- 
tainly." Upon this I take a black cloth and put it into 
his hand. "You feel this dog quite plainly?" "Quite 
plainly." "Now you can open your eyes. You will see 
the dog clearly. Then you will go to sleep again, and not 
wake till I tell you." (He opens his eyes, looks at the 
imaginary dog and strokes it.) I take the cloth out of his 
hand, and lay it on the floor. (He stands up and reaches 
out for it.) Although he is in my room, when I tell him 
that he is in the Zoological Gardens he believes it and sees 
trees, and so on. 



98 HYPNOTISM. 

Here is Prof. Bernheim's method. 

"I begin by saying to the patient that I believe benefit is 
to be derived from the use of suggestive therapeutics ; that 
it is possible to cure or relieve him by hypnotism; that 
there is nothing either hurtful or strange about it ; that it 
is an ordinary sleep, or torpor, which can be induced in 
every one, and that this quiet, beneficial condition restores 
the equilibrium of the nervous system, etc. If necessary, 
I hypnotize one or two subjects in his presence, in order 
te show him that there is nothing painful in this condition, 
and that it is not accompanied by any unusual sensation. 
When I have thus banished from his mind the idea of 
magnetism and the somewhat mysterious fear that at- 
taches to that unknown condition, above all when he has 
seen patients cured or benefited by the means in question, 
he is no longer suspicious, but gives himself up. Then I 
say, Xook at me, and think of nothing but sleep. Your 
eyelids begin to feel heavy, your eyes tired. They begin 
to wink, they are getting moist, you cannot see distinctly. 
They are closed.' Some patients close their eyes and are 
asleep immediately. With others, I have to repeat, lay 
more stress on what I say, and even make gestures. It 
makes little difference what sort of gesture is made. I 
hold two fingers of my right hand before the patient's 
eyes and ask him to look at them, or pass both hands sev- 
eral times before his eyes, or persuade him to fix his eyes 
upon mine, endeavoring, at the same time, to concentrate 
his attention upon the idea of sleep. I say, 'Your lids are 
closing, you cannot open them again. Your arms feel 
heavy, so do your legs. You cannot feel anything. Your 
hands are motionless. You see nothing, you are going 
to sleep.' And I add, in a commanding tone, 'Sleep/ 
This word often turns the balance. The eyes close, the 
patient sleeps, or is at least influenced. I use the word 
'sleep/ in order to obtain as far as possible over the pa- 
tients a suggestive influence which shall bring about sleep, 
or a state closely approaching it; for sleep, properly so 



HYPNOTISM. 99 

called, does not always occur. If the patients have no 
inclination to sleep, and show no drowsiness, I take care 
to say that sleep is not essential ; that the hypnotic influ- 
ence, whence comes the benefit, may exist without sleep; 
that many patients are hypnotized, although they do not 
sleep. 

"If the patient does not shut his eyes or keep them shut, 
I do not require them to be fixed on mine, or on my 
fingers, for any length of time, for it sometimes happens 
that they remain wide open indefinitely, and instead of the 
idea of sleep being conceived, only a rigid fixation of the 
eyes results. In this case, closure of the eyes by the 
operator succeeds better. After keeping them fixed one 
or two minutes, I push the eyelids down, or stretch them 
slowly over the eyes, gradually closing them more and 
more, and so imitating the process of natural sleep. Fin- 
ally, I keep them closed, repeating the suggestion, 'Your 
lids are stuck together, you cannot open them. The need 
of sleep becomes greater and greater, you can no longer 
resist.' I lower my voice gradually, repeating the com- 
mand, 'Sleep,' and it is very seldom that more than three 
minutes pass before sleep or some degree of hypnotic in- 
fluence is obtained. It is sleep by suggestion, — a type 
of sleep which I insinuate into the brain. 

"Passes or gazing at the eyes or fingers of the operator 
are only useful in concentrating the attention ; they are 
not absolutely essential. 

"As soon as they are able to pay attention and under- 
stand, children are, as a rule, very quickly and very easily 
hypnotized. It often suffices to close their eyes, to hold 
them shut a few moments, to tell them to sleep, and then 
to state that they are asleep. 

"Some adults go to sleep just as readily by simple 
closure of the eyes. I often proceed immediately, without 
making use of passes or fixation, by shutting the eyelids, 
gently holding them closed, asking the patient to keep 
them together, and suggesting at the same time the phe- 



LofC. 



ioo HYPNOTISM. 

nomena of sleep. Some of them fall rapidly into a more 
or less deep sleep. Others offer more resistance. I some- 
times succeed by keeping the eyes closed for some time, 
commanding silence and quiet, talking continuously, and 
repeating the same formulas : 'You feel a sort of drowsi- 
ness, a torpor ; your arms and legs are motionless. Your 
eyelids are warm. Your nervous system is quiet; you 
have no will. Your eyes remain closed. Sleep is coming,' 
etc. After keeping up this auditory suggestion for several 
minutes, I remove my fingers. The eyes remain closed. 
I raise the patient's arms ; they remain uplifted. We 
have induced cataleptic sleep." 

Having succeeded in inducing sleep, or getting the pa- 
tient in a passive and receptive condition, the operator 
then proceeds to suggest the idea of recovery from the 
disease with which he is afflicted. On this subject the 
author speaks as follows: 

"The patient is put to sleep by means of suggestion, 
that is, by making the idea of sleep penetrate the mind. 
He is treated by means of suggestion; that is, by making 
the idea of cure penetrate the mind. The subject being 
hypnotized, M. Liebault's method consists in affirming 
in a loud voice the disappearance of his symptoms. 

"We try to make him believe that these symptoms no 
longer exist, or that they will disappear, the pain will 
vanish ; tiiat the feeling will come back to his limbs ; that 
the muscular strength will increase ; and that his appetite 
will come back. We profit by the special psychical re- 
ceptivity created by the hypnosis, by the cerebral docility, 
by the exalted ideo-motor, ideo-sensitive, ideo-sensorial 
reflex activity, in order to provoke useful reflexes, to per- 
suade the brain to do what it can to transform the ac- 
cepted idea into reality. 

"Such is the method of therapeutic-suggestion of which 
M. Liebault is the founder. He was the first to clearly es- 
tablish that the cures obtained by the old magnetizers, 
and even by Braid's hypnotic operations, are not the work 



HYPNOTISM. 101 

either of a mysterious fluid or of physiological modifica- 
tions due to special manipulations, but the work of sug- 
gestion alone. The whole system of magnetic medicine 
is only the medicine of the imagination ; the imagination 
is put into such a condition by the hypnosis that it cannot 
escape from the suggestion. 

"M. L,iebault's method was ignored a long time, even 
by the physicians at Nancy. In 1884 Charles Richet was 
satisfied to say that magnetism often has advantages, that 
it calms nervous agitation, and that it may cure or benefit 
certain insomnias. 

"Since 1882 I have experimented with the suggestive 
method which I have seen used by M. Liebault, though 
timidly at first, and without any confidence. Today it 
is used daily in my clinic ; I practice it before my students ; 
perhaps no day passes in which I do not show them some 
functional trouble, pain, paresis, uneasiness, insomnia, 
either moderated or instantly suppressed by suggestion. 

"For example : a child is brought to me with a pain 
like muscular rheumatism in its arm, dating back four or 
five days. The arm is painful to pressure ; the child can- 
not lift it to its head. I say to him, 'shut your eyes, my 
child, and go to sleep.' I hold his eyelids closed, and go 
on talking to him. 'You are asleep, and you will keep on 
sleeping until I tell you to wake up. You are sleeping 
very well, as if you were in your bed. ' You are perfectly 
well and comfortable ; your arms and legs and your whole 
body are asleep, and you cannot move.' I take my fingers 
off his eyelids, and they remain closed ; I put his arms up, 
and they remain so. Then, touching the painful arm, I 
say, 'The pain has gone away. You have no more pain 
anywhere ; you can move your arm without any pain ; and 
when you wake up you will not feel any more pain. It 
will not come back any more.' In order to increase the 
force of the suggestion by embodying it, so as to speak, 
in a material sensation, following M. Liebault's example 
I suggest a feeling of warmth loco dolente. The heat 



102 HYPNOTISM. 

takes the place of the pain. I say to the child, 'You feel 
that your arm is warm; the warmth increases, and you 
have no more pain/ 

"I wake the child in a few minutes; he remembers 
nothing; the sleep has been profound. The pain has al- 
most completely disappeared ; the child lifts the arm easily 
to his head. I see the father on the day following : he is 
the postman who brings my letters. He tells me that the 
pain has disappeared completely, and that there has been 
no return of it. 

"Here, again, is a man twenty-six years old, a work- 
man in the foundries. For a year he has experienced a 
painful feeling of constriction over the epigastrium, also 
a pain in the corresponding region of the back, which was 
the result of an effort made in bending an iron bar. The 
sensation is continuous, and increases when he has worked 
for some hours. For six months he has been able to 
sleep only by pressing his epigastrium with his hand. I 
hypnotize him. In the first seance I can induce only 
simple drowsiness ; he wakes spontaneously ; the pain con- 
tinues. I hypnotize him a second time, telling him that 
he will sleep more deeply, and that he will remember 
nothing when he wakes. Catalepsy is not present. I 
wake him in a few minutes ; he does not remember that 
I spoke to him, that I assured him that the pain had dis- 
appeared. It has completely disappeared; he no longer 
feels any constriction. I do not know whether it has re- 
appeared." 

The foregoing extracts present the gist of the methods 
employed by the Nancy school of hypnotism. The hyp- 
notic condition is induced solely by oral suggestion, and 
the disease is removed by the same means. 

The operator must study all methods and adopt the 
ones the most effective. The method of Braid is the 
easiest and requires the least skill. 

Let your subject sit in an easy chair or lie down on the 
sofa. Calm your subject by making a few gentle strokes 



HYPNOTISM. 103 

on the forehead and temples. Then take some bright 
object, a ring, button or piece of money, and hold it in 
front and a little behind the eyes, so as to strain the eyes. 

Hold this object about ten minutes above the eyes. Tell 
your subject to gaze at the button. Do not let the subject 
wink the eye if possible. Let her gaze for two or three 
minutes. All the time keep up the suggestion that she is 
going to sleep. With this strain upon the eye very few 
can gaze more than three or five minutes. When the eyes 
close, continue the suggestion that she is sleeping. Re- 
peat, "Sleepy, drowsy," etc. I have found the following 
method quite successful : 

Let your subject get quiet. Sit down by her and tell 
her that she must go to sleep. Say to her: "When I 
count one, shut your eyes. When I count two open your 
eyes ; now, ready. One, two ; one, two ; one, two." When 
you count one, eyes shut, pause much longer than on two. 
Finally count one and wait three or four seconds, sug- 
gesting that she cannot now open her eyes. In a few 
moments her eyes will not open when you count two. 

Authors differ as to the number of degrees in hypnot- 
ism. I will give but three : 

1. Lethargy — In which the subject is asleep. 

2. Catalepsy — In which state the body is rigid. In 
this condition you can put the head of the subject on one 
chair and his feet upon another. He can sustain the body. 
Another man may sit down on him and he will sustain 
the extra weight. Sensation is largely gone. Stick a 
pin in the subject, and he does not feel it. Under hypnotic 
influence teeth have been extracted and operations per- 
formed without any pain to the subject. In England a 
hg was amputated without any knowledge to the subject. 

3. Somnambulism — In this state the subject obeys 
your suggestion. If you tell the subject to open his eyes, 
go to the piano and play a tune, he will do it. Tell him 
he is the Governor of the State, and at once he will as- 
sume a dignity not natural for him. Tell him that he is 



104 HYPNOTISM. 

a drunken tramp, and he acts like a drunkard. You can 
get him to personate a dog, a man, a child, or whatever 
you suggest. When he awakes he remembers nothing 
that he has done. 

Post-Hypnotic Suggestion. — By post-hypnotic sug- 
gestion we mean the power to suggest to the hypnotic 
subject that he will do certain things when he wakes. 
When you are talking to a hypnotized person suggest to 
him that when he wakes up he will go and get a drink. 
He is sure to do so. Say to him, "At noon to-morrow 
you will sing 'Sweet Bye and Bye.' " Tell the subject 
that he will go to bed one hour earlier than usual. He 
gets sleepy at the hour. 

Post-suggestion may be used to good advantage in cur- 
ing people of hallucinations or bad habits. If a man is 
given to drink, in the hypnotic state tell him whisky makes 
him sick. Tell him emphatically that when he wakes up 
he will not want whisky. His subjective mind remembers 
the suggestion and carries it out. I saw W. E. Harlow 
hypnotize a young man who was addicted to cigarette 
smoking. He said to him in the hypnotic condition : 
"When you wake you will never want to smoke. Cigar- 
ettes will make you sick. If you smoke you will vomit. 
What did I tell you?" "The young man replied: "If I 
smoke cigarettes I will vomit." After having him repeat 
this several times the subject waked up. The next morn- 
ing when he lighted his cigarette he became deathly pale 
and vomited. It is known that you can hypnotize a man 
and tell him to wake at 4 o'clock and he will do so. All 
of us know that when sick we took some nasty medicine 
in coffee or baked apples. We gave up the use of coffee, 
for we could taste quinine in it. 

Dr. Carpenter treated a lady in Washington City for 
partial loss of eyesight. She could not read on account 
of her defective eyesight. Under hypnotic influence we 
can see and hear better. He hypnotized the lady and 
gave her a paper to read. She read fairly well. In her 



HYPNOTISM. 105 

waking condition she remembered nothing that had been 
told her. He treated her four times. In the last treat- 
ment he said : "Now to-morrow your eyesight will re- 
turn. You can read." The next morning she came down- 
stairs and shouted : "Husband, I can read as well as 
when I was sixteen I" By post-hypnotism the memory 
may be strengthened. Children may be cured of bad 
habits, and the power to resist may be greatly enhanced. 
No improper suggestion should ever be made. 

Auto-Suggestion. — Auto-hypnotism is self-hypnot- 
ism. 

The fakir hypnotizes himself by gazing intently at some 
object. The clairvoyant medium is self -hypnotized. 
Many people are in a semi-hypnotic condition in seances, 
religious frenzy and fanaticism. They are on the sub- 
jective plane. Many apparent mysteries can be explained 
by auto-suggestion. Great religious addresses, bursts of 
oratory and the harangues of pious religious fanatics can 
be accounted for by understanding the laws of sugges- 
tion. Many persons constantly suggest to themselves 
that they have certain diseases. The auto-suggestion 
brings about the symptoms of the disease. 

The: Dangers from Hypnotism. — The dangers from 
hypnotism have been greatly exaggerated. The wonder- 
ful cases where subjects died under hypnotic conditions 
or committed crimes are always far away. No one ever 
died under hypnotic influence. We have heard of cases, 
but all are false. Hypnotize a person and go off and let 
him alone and he will come back to normal condition soon. 

No one can be hynotized without his consent. Hyp- 
notism does not weaken the mind, but may strengthen it. 
True, if a man goes into the hypnotic state constantly he 
may become stupid and sluggish. If he sleeps naturally 
three or four times a day, the same effect is produced. 
No wise man will permit a hypnotist to hypnotize him too 
often. As in natural sleep, take a hypnotic sleep only 



106 HYPNOTISM. 

when you need it. Instead of hypnotism being injurious, 
it is nature's sweet rest. 

We hear people say great crimes are committed by per- 
sons in the hypnotic state. Remember the subjective mind 
never sleeps. A hypnotized person will not commit any 
crime that he would not commit in the waking hours. 
The law of self-preservation and the fixed moral convic- 
tions of a person cannot be overcome. If a person is a 
forger, he may forge a note under hypnotic influence. If 
he is honest, he will not forge a note. Offer a man ad- 
dicted to drink a glass of whisky and he will drink it. 
Offer the whisky to a lady who will not drink in her 
waking hours and she will refuse. If you insist, she will 
pass out of the hypnotic state. If a woman would allow 
liberties when awake, she might do so under hypnosis. 
Prof. Carpenter, in Boston, hypnotized a man and said to 
him : "Do you see that man there by the window ? He 
intends to kill you. Take this dagger and stab him before 
he kills you." Prof. C. gave him a paper dagger. He 
rushed over and struck the man. When he came back 
Prof. C. told him that he missed his enemy, gave him a 
real glittering dagger and said : "Take this and kill 
him." He took the dagger and drew back, but paused. 
The law of self-preservation stepped in and said, "Halt." 

In Buffalo a noted hypnotist hypnotized a young girl 
and attempted to kiss her. She burst into tears and with 
a fright came to consciousness. True, you can get young 
subjects to do anything, provided the thing is not con- 
trary to their natures and fixed habits. Hypnotize a 
romping boy, ask him to turn a somersault, and he will. 
Ask a dignified man or a cultured woman to do the same 
thing and neither will obey you. 

There is a limit to suggestion. You can get a subject 
to pick the pockets of the person in the audience. But 
all the time he knows he is among his friends and is only 
playing. He follows the suggestion of the operator, but 
knows he is only acting. Like children who play bear 



HYPNOTISM. 107 

They dress one of their company up as a bear. When the 
bear gets after them they are driven into terror. They 
run, cry and call for help. Yet all the time they know 
they are playing. 

There are two dangers that should be avoided : 

1. Under hypnotism the operator may make a post- 
suggestion which the subject may unconsciously carry 
out in his waking hours. In all cases of hypnotism there 
should be present one or two other persons. 

2. Auto-hypnotism may make people sick. Many 
gloomy people brood over supposed ailments. They are 
constantly suggesting that they have the symptoms of 
kidney disease or consumption. This repeated sugges- 
tion will bring about the symptoms of these diseases. 

Hypnotism Applikd to Disease. — The hypnotists 
have cured many diseases. They have healed the cripple, 
restored eyesight and allayed the fever by the power of 
suggestion. 

Remember, the subjective mind is amenable to sugges- 
tion. Suggestion cures or makes sick. Plant the sug- 
gestion upon the subjective mind that he has swallowed 
poison, and convulsions will follow. 

Caution should be used in giving suggestion. Mere 
affirmation and repetition have led to contagion. Affirm 
a thing, repeat it again and again and it may become con- 
tagious. An ignorant priest harangued his flock about 
the wickedness of permitting the tomb of the Savior to 
remain in the possession of pagans. Repeating this ha- 
rangue again and again caused the ignorant and the rab- 
ble to rally to his cause. The enthusiasm reached the 
middle classes, and finally kings, monarchs, soldiers and 
the educated were carried away by this epidemic. He 
who opposed the crusade was denounced as a heretic and 
an enemy to the church. Suggest to a boy that he is dull, 
and he begins to think he is stupid. If a child is careless 
and blundering in his manner, do not tell him he is always 
a stupid dunce. Repeating it makes him believe it. Bet- 



108 HYPNOTISM. 

ter let him beat you at some game or a race. If he excels 
once, he begins to have confidence. Tell children they 
are liars, frauds and thieves, and if they have not the 
pluck to resent it they will follow the suggestion and be 
liars, frauds and thieves. 

Suggestion has driven many girls to shame. Tell a 
girl she is a worthless creature and that no one has con- 
fidence in her, and unless an adverse suggestion is given, 
the chances are she will be worthless. 

Suggestion has killed many people. A great author in 
England had a dream that he would die on his eightieth 
birthday. At first he told the story in fun, but as he grew 
older it became a conviction. A few friends met to spend 
the evening with him. Some one playfully pushed the 
clock ahead and said : "Ha, ha ! It is past midnight, and 
you are not dead." He replied : "I do not understand it. 
I never doubted for a moment that I would die." Alas, 
the friends had forgotten the town clock. At the stroke 
of twelve the author fell dead. Suggestion has sent per- 
sons into the trance and they have been buried alive. The 
patient is very weak, hence in the subjective condition. 
The physician says, "She is very sick." The patient re- 
peats, "I am very sick." It may be while she is sleeping, 
the physician says, "She cannot live." The patient's sub- 
jective mind hears him and accepts the suggestion. The 
members of the family show emotion and confirm the 
suggestion. The patient becomes unconscious. The at- 
tendant says she is dying. She accepts the suggestion 
and sinks into a trance. It is a case of suspended anima- 
tion. The physician says, "She is dead." Though in a 
trance condition, she hears all and thinks she is dead, and 
she is buried alive. Dr. Hudson says : "Hundreds of 
cases of suspended animation which are pronounced 
death are reported to me every year." The patient sees 
and knows that preparation is made for burial. This does 
not worry him, nor is it inconsistent. Prof. Hudson 
knows a lady teacher who had been prepared for burial 



HYPNOTISM. 109 

twice. Near Indianapolis a girl was declared dead. She 
was robed for burial and placed in the coffin. Her little 
brother, not knowing what death meant, said: " Sister, 
what do you want?" "Water," was the reply. At this 
writing (1904) the girl, now a woman, lives in Indian- 
apolis. As suggestion may cure or make sick, encourage 
or discourage, save or kill, great caution should be exer- 
cised in giving it. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

SPIRITUALISM. 

The belief that the living communicate with the spirits 
of the dead is as old as the race. Although the Spiritual- 
ists talk flippantly about modern Spiritualism, the past 
had its seances, spirit manifestations and ghost shows. 
That the spirits of the dead come back to this world to 
impart information was the common conviction of the 
Middle Ages. The common claim of modern Spiritualists 
is that they have ushered in a new era, a new dispensation. 
Things that seem new are often very old. 

Ancient Spirit Communication. — Herodotus, the 
Greek historian, relates that Periander, the ruler of Cor- 
inth, 450 B. C, sent messengers to consult the oracles of 
the dead. These Grecian Spiritualists, like the modern, 
tried to peep into the future by invoking the spirits of 
the dead. Spiritualism was as rife in Rome as in Greece. 
Strabo, 25 B. C, tells us that the spirits of the dead make 
known to us hidden things. 

Marcellinus, the Roman historian, tells us that in 395 
A. D. certain eminent statesmen consulted the spirits to 
divine who would be the next Emperor. This seance was 
not a success, for these politicians were condemned for 
plotting treason. 

The Spiritualists of India, two thousand years ago, had 
their spirit manifestations. They taught that the air was 
tenanted with the spirits of the dead. These spirits could 
be consulted. The information they gave was of no value. 
Just like the mediums of to-day, they tell you supposed 
truths about your grandmother, but lie about the Savior 
and deny revelation. 

The inhabitants of Canaan were expelled from the land 
because they practiced necromancy, which was the art of 
consulting the dead. 



SPIRITUALISM. in 

Greece, Rome, India and Canaan, with their horrible 
barbarities, lewdness and infamy, were hotbeds of spirit 
manifestations. 

In its native haunts of darkness and vice, Spiritualism 
flourished in its proper elements. The mysterious rap- 
pings, knockings, stone-throwing and ringing of bells 
have been reported among all nations. Take the ghosts 
and spirit manifestations out of Shakespeare and not 
much would be left in some of his dramas. In the house 
of John Mompesson in England, 1661, they heard spirit 
rappings anr 1 smelled sulphur. Boots, hats and chairs 
moved across the room without anyone touching them. 
This is quite like a modern seance. In 1649 commission- 
ers sent from Parliament in London occupied the Castle 
of Woodstock. In the night chairs danced over the room, 
mysterious noises haunted them. In great fright the 
commissioners fled to London. In 1717 the Wesley fam- 
ily, in Epworth, were disturbed by hearing noises. Mrs. 
Wesley, the mother of John Wesley, said : "We heard 
noises over our heads, as people walking. They ran up 
and down stairs ; we .heard the crash as of breaking bot- 
tles. The next night we heard the knocking as usual." 

John Wesley relates these rapping stories and seemed 
to credit them. He tells us he saw the bed on which his 
sister was sitting rise into the air. 

Spiritualism was common in France, England and Ger- 
many years before the Rochester manifestations. Mes- 
merism created quite an excitement in this country about 
1830. The hypnotic sleep, or mesmerized condition, not 
then understood, prepared the way for the visions of 
Spiritualistic mediums. 

Prof. J. Stanley Grimes created much interest by en- 
trancing his subjects and causing them to address audi- 
ences in language not in keeping with the knowledge of 
the subjects. He was the foremost mesmerist in this 
country. It was my pleasure to witness his exposition 
twenty years ago. He was the first to give a scientific 



ii2 SPIRITUALISM. 

explanation of the wonders of hypnotism. He has done 
more to show the follies of Spiritualism than any one 
man on the continent. He tore off the mask of mysticism 
and applied scientific investigation to these supposed mys- 
terious manifestations. 

These communications and manifestations were called 
by the ancients the caprices of the gods ; by the church of 
the Middle Ages, witchcraft; by the dupes of mediums, 
Spiritualism ; by Dr. Grimes, psychic force within the 
living. Trances and spirit visitations were reported in 
Germany. One Frederica HaufT, the Seeress of Provorst, 
is reported to have held communication with the spirits 
of the dead. We have the report of persons in England 
in 1844 who could, in a trance, see with the eyes closed 
(clairvoyance). In America Andrew Jackson Davis 
played an important part in preparing the way for the 
delusion of Spiritualism. In 1843, m Poughkeepsie, N. 
Y., Prof. Grimes delivered a series of lectures on mes- 
merism. Among those that he hypnotized (then called 
mesmerism instead of hypnotism) was a young college 
graduate by the name of Potter. While hypnotized, Prof. 
Grimes told him he was Henry Clay. Potter assumed a 
dignity and used language not natural to him. Again he 
was told that he was Daniel Webster and told to address 
the audience. At once, in a solemn tone, he began : "I 
thank God, Mr. President, that my lot has been cast in 
this country." The next day the professor hypnotized 
Potter in his private room and gave him a lecture on the 
nervous system, which lesson he repeated in the hypnotic 
state. Mr. Grimes told the young man, while in the hyp- 
notic state, that he would hypnotize him that night and 
would have him repeat this lecture on the nerves to the 
audience. The subjective mind never forgets. In the 
waking moments he did not remember the lesson, but 
that night, while in the hypnotic state, he repeated the 
entire lecture, to the amazement of the audience. Men 
who knew Potter said : "That is a spirit. Potter cannot 



SPIRITUALISM. 113 

talk that way." Prof. Grimes understood the psychic law 
and knew it was only the subjective mind. In the audi- 
ence was a young man, Andrew Jackson Davis, who that 
night took his first lesson in mediumship. Dr. Grimes 
said to young Potter : "When did you learn that lesson 
on the nerves ?" Potter replied : "The spirit of a great 
doctor taught me that lesson." In his waking state Pot- 
ter insisted that a spirit had taught him the lesson. The 
professor explained all to the audience. A tailor by the 
name of Levingston, who saw Dr. Grimes experiment 
with young Potter, succeeded in hypnotizing Davis. In 
this trance state Davis would give out spirit communica- 
tions. The next year Davis began a lecture tour with Dr. 
Lyon as his manager. The doctor would throw Davis 
into a trance and he would then give out spirit messages. 
These spirit communications, full of incoherent babblings, 
were printed in a book, and the occultists went wild over 
the wonderful medium. Everything was now ready for 
modern Spiritualism to make its appearance. 

THE FOX GIRLS. 

Modern Spiritualism originated at Hydesville, N. Y., near 
the famous Mormon Kill. In this village a house was reputed to 
be haunted. John D. Fox was not afraid of ghosts and moved 
into this house, because the rent was cheap. The family consisted 
of the father, mother and two daughters, Margaret, aged twelve, 
and Kate, nine. A married son, David, lived near the village, 
and a married daughter, Leah, lived in Rochester. In history 
Leah is known as Mrs. Fish, Mrs. Brown, and Mrs. Underhill. 
Margaret is said to have married Dr. Kane, the great explorer. 
It is certain that he induced her for a while to abandon medium- 
ship, and after his death she always wore his name. 

Early in 1848 the Fox family began to hear noises in this 
historic house. One night Kate Fox cried out, "Who art thou, 
Old Splitfoot?" I know not what she meant; I simply record 
the events. The girls went to sleep, but Mrs. Fox held her first 
seance. She began to interrogate the intruder. She said : "If 
you are a spirit, rap three times." Three raps. "How old is 
my youngest daughter?" Nine raps. "How old is my elder 
daughter?" Twelve raps. "Are you in trouble?" One rap, no. 
The next morning the little town was ablaze with excitement. 
The family moved to Rochester, where Spiritualism became the 
wonder of the day. Mediums multiplied rapidly. The Fox fam- 



114 SPIRITUALISM. 

ily had been farmers by occupation and Methodists by profession. 
That these girls were defrauding the people seemed not to enter 
the minds of the populace. Spiritualism became an epidemic. 
But fraud will out. It began to be whispered by the relatives 
of the Fox girls that these raps were tricks. Elizabeth Fish, a 
niece of Kate and Margaret, said that Kate learned to make the 
raps by pressing her toes against the footboard of the bed. Dr. 
Grimes with others went at once to investigate. Here he gives 
the confession of Mrs. Culver : 

DEPOSITION OF MRS. NORMAN CULVER. 

"I am, by marriage, a connection of the Fox girls; their 
brother married my husband's sister. The girls have been a 
great deal at my house, and, for about two years, I was a very 
sincere believer in the rappings ; but some things which I saw, 
when I was visiting the girls at Rochester, made me suspect that 
they were deceiving. I resolved to satisfy myself, in some way ; 
and, some time afterwards, I made a proposition to Catharine to 
assist her in producing the manifestations. I had a cousin visit- 
ing me from Michigan, who was going to consult the spirits, and 
I told Catharine that if they intended to go to Detroit, it would 
be a great thing for them to convince him ; I also told her, that, 
if I could do anything to help her, I would do it cheerfully — 
that I would probably be able to answer all the questions he 
would ask, and I would do it if she would show me how to make 
the raps. She said that, as Margaretta was absent, she wanted 
somebody to help her, and that, if I would become a medium, 
she would explain it all to me. She said that when my cousin 
consulted the spirits, I must sit next to her, and touch her arm 
when the right letter was called. I did so, and was able to 
answer nearly all the questions correctly. After I had helped 
her in this way a few times, she revealed to me the secret. The 
raps are produced with the toes. All the toes are used. After 
nearly a week's practice, with Catharine showing me how, I 
could produce them perfectly myself. At first it was very hard 
work to do it. Catharine told me to warm my feet, or put them 
in warm water, and it would then be easier work to rap; she 
said that she sometimes had to warm her feet three or four times 
in the course of an evening. I found that heating my feet did 
enable me to rap a great deal easier. I have sometimes pro- 
duced a hundred and fifty raps in succession. I can rap with 
all the toes on both feet — it is most difficult to rap with the 
great toe. 

"Catharine told me how to manage to answer the questions. 
She said it was generally easy enough to answer right if the 
one who asked the questions called the alphabet. She said the 
reason why they asked people to write down several names on 
paper, and' then' point to them till the spirit rapped at the right 
one. was to give them a chance to watch the countenance and 
motions of the person; and that, in that way, they could nearly 



SPIRITUALISM. 115 

always guess right. She also explained how they held down 
and moved the tables. (Mrs. Culver gave us some illustrations 
of the tricks.) She told me that all I should' have to do to make 
the raps heard on the table would be to put my foot on the 
bottom of the table when I rapped, and then, when I wished to 
make the raps sound distinct on the wall, I must make them 
louder and direct my own eyes earnestly to the spot where I 
wished them to be heard. She said if I could put my foot 
against the bottom of the door, the raps would be heard on the 
top of the door. Catharine told me that when the committee 
held their ankles, in Rochester, the Dutch servant-girl rapped 
with her knuckles, under the floor, from the cellar. The girl 
was instructed to rap whenever she heard their voices calling 
the spirits. Catharine also showed me how they made the 
sounds of sawing and planing boards. (The whole trick was 
explained to us.) When I was at Rochester last January Mar- 
garetta told me that when people insisted on seeing her feet and 
toes, she could produce a few raps with her knee and ankle. 

"Elizabeth Fish (Mrs. Fish's daughter), who now lives with 
her father, was the first one who produced these raps. She acci- 
dentally discovered the way to make them by playing with her 
toes against the footboard while in bed. Catharine told me that 
the reason why Elizabeth went away West to live with her father 
was because she was too conscientious to become a medium. 
The whole secret was revealed to me, with the understanding 
that I should practice as a medium when the girls were away. 
Catharine said that, whenever I practiced, I had better have my 
little girl at the table with me, and make folks believe that she 
was the medium, for she said that they would not suspect so 
young a child of any tricks. After I had obtained the whole 
secret, I plainly told Catharine that my only object was to find 
out how the tricks were done, and that I should never go any 
further in this imposition. She was very much frightened, and 
said she believed that I meant to tell of it and expose them ; and 
if I did, she would swear it was a lie. She was so nervous and 
excited that I had to sleep with her that night. When she was 
instructing me how to be a medium, she told me how frightened 
they used to get in New York, for fear somebody would detect 
them ; and gave me the whole history of all the tricks they 
played upon the people there. She said that once Margaretta 
spoke aloud, and the whole party believed it was a spirit. 

"Mrs. Norman Culver." 

"We hereby certify that Mrs. Culver is one of the most reput- 
able and intelligent ladies in the town of Arcadia. We were 
present when she made the disclosures contained in the above 
paper ; we had heard the same from her before, and we cheer- 
fully bear testimony that there cannot be the slightest doubt of 
the truth of the whole statement. C. G. Pomeroy, M. D., 

"Rev. D. S. Chase." 



n6 SPIRITUALISM. 

Prof. Flint, Sen., of the Bellevue Medical College, one of the 
ablest medical authors in America, and Prof. Lee, of the 'Buffalo 
University, investigated the subject and found a lady in Buffalo 
who could perform precisely what the Fox girls did, and make 
raps by a peculiar movement of the bones of the knees. The fol- 
lowing extracts from Prof. Lee's letter gives the account of their 
experiences : 

"To the Editors of the Tribune: 

"Mrs. Fish and Miss Fox were requested to be seated on 
chairs, their limbs extended and their heels resting on cushions. 
The reasons for placing them in this position were stated — viz., 
that we believed, in order that the raps should be heard, that the 
feet should have some solid support, serving as a fulcrum: else 
the contraction of the muscles of the leg would not throw the 
bone (head of tibia) out of place; or if so, no sound would be 
heard, unless the concussion or vibration, which would be thus 
produced, could be communicated to some sonorous, or vibrating 
body. While thus seated, more than fifty minutes elapsed, dur- 
ing which no 'raps' were heard, though the 'spirits' were urged, 
and called upon, by Mrs. F., to 'manifest' themselves. A part 
of this time Miss Fox was allowed to seat herself on the sofa — 
her limbs and feet resting on the cushions of the same. No 
sounds having been heard, it was suggested that the ladies be 
allowed to take any position they pleased, and see if any 'raps' 
were then heard. Accordingly, they seated themselves on the 
sofa, their feet resting on the floor, when immediately a loud 
succession of 'raps' followed, and continued for several min- 
utes. We then proposed to try another test ; so, seating our- 
selves before the ladies, we grasped each of their knees firmly, 
so as to prevent any lateral movement of the bones ; the 'raps' 
immediately ceased and were not heard while the knees were 
thus held, except near the close of the experiment, which con- 
tinued, once, forty minutes, when two slight sounds were heard, 
on slightly relaxing my grasp, while, at the same time, I dis- 
tinctly felt the heads of the bones grating on each other, and the 
muscles contracting, which, though a very positive kind of evi- 
dence to me, I am aware is not so satisfactory to bystanders. 

"I should state that our hands were removed several times 
from the knees, during the trial, and 'raps' were always heard 
during the interval of removal. At the close of the sitting, 
which continued till past eleven o'clock, Miss Fox was much 
affected, and shed many tears, which excited much sympathy on 
the part of some of the gentlemen present. I need not add that 
our position was triumphantly sustained, and that public opinion 
here is now almost universally on our side. 

* ***** * 

"You may, very naturally, ask, Why has not this physiological 
phenomenon been known to physicians before? I answer, that 
it has, so far as the smaller joints are concerned. Every person, 



SPIRITUALISM. 117 

almost, can snap their finger-joints; many, also, as Mr. Burr, 
can snap their toe-joints, and some thenr ankles, producing a 
pretty loud 'rap,' when placed in contact with some sonorous 
body ; but the same phenomenon is very seldom met with in the 
larger joints, as the knees; and when it is, it has escaped par- 
ticular observation, and not been made known to physicians, as 
it neither requires, perhaps, nor admits, of medical aid. 

"But it may be said by some that the above explanation is 
not altogether satisfactory, inasmuch as these 'rappings' are 
heard in different parts of the room at the same time ; or, some- 
times, on the table, then the door, then the walls of the room, 
and at a distance from the 'rappers,' etc. After spending several 
hours a day, for three days, with Mrs. Fish and Miss F., during 
which the 'raps' were invariably heard, whenever called for, 
without, as I recollect, a single exception, I found that in no 
one instance did the sounds seem to proceed from the door, 
unless Miss F. was near enough to touch it with her heel ; nor 
did the sounds seem to proceed from the table, unless she was 
near enough to the leg of the table to touch it with her foot; 
but, generally, they proceeded from the floor, apparently, in her 
vicinity, although the floor could be felt to vibrate, at the same 
distance from her, just as the whole table would vibrate, when 
she placed her foot against one of its legs. Much of the confu- 
sion and error on this subject arises, doubtless, from an igno- 
rance of the laws which regulate the propagation of sounds." 

The Fox girls were exposed by Drs. Flint and Lee, of 
Buffalo. They affirmed that these sounds were made by 
the toes and ankles of the mediums. So humiliating were 
these exposures that the mediums for some time refused 
to submit to the tests. 

Henry Seybert, an enthusiastic believer in Spiritualism, 
shortly before his death, presented a large sum of money 
to be used for the purpose of investigating Spiritualism. 
The committee consisted of ten learned men. T. R. Haz- 
ard, a Spiritualist, was chairman. They began their work 
in 1884 and continued four years. They reported : 

1. That Spiritualism is fraudulent. 

2. That all slate-writing and spirit photography are 
performed by legerdemain. 

3. That the spirit manifestations and materializations 
are not genuine. 

4. That mediums are opposed to critical tests. 

5. That there is no evidence that mediums are under 



Ii8 SPIRITUALISM. 

the influence of departed spirits. 

Mrs. Kane (Margaret Fox) gave seances before this 
committee. In this investigation Mrs. Kane said : "I do 
not pledge myself to conform to anything. I do not even 
say these raps come from the spirits of the dead. It is 
beyond human power to tell." After a careful investiga- 
tion, the committee told Mrs. Kane that they were satis- 
fied that the sounds came from her own body. They in- 
vited her to go through another test, but assured her the 
test would be thorough. She refused. The culmination 
of the whole matter came, when, in 1888, Mrs. Kane and 
Kate Fox exposed the entire trick. Mrs. Kane took off 
her shoe and showed how she could throw her toe out of 
place and make it rap. Kate assented to this exposure, 
but later claimed that there were genuine manifestations. 
What a fall ! For forty years Margaret had been star- 
tling the world with her wonderful performances. Sim- 
pletons had been bowing down to a sprained toe. The 
mother of Spiritism admits that it is all fraud and delu- 
sion. Other exposures followed. 

The spirits of a noted pirate, John King, and of his 
famous daughter, Katie, declared that their ancestors 
were pre-Adamic. The spirit of Katie came to convince 
many of the communication with spirits of the dead. The 
crowned heads of Europe as well as the scientists of this 
country held conversation with Katie King. Dr. Robert 
Dale Owen, twice elected to Congress from Indiana, a 
gentleman of great learning, became a champion of Spir- 
itualism. He wrote in 1874: "I am thoroughly con- 
vinced of the truth of Spiritualism." 

He attended the seances of Kate and Margaret Fox, 
Mrs. Fay and Mrs. Holmes. He was constantly with the 
Fox girls. Dr. Owen said : "I have seen the materializa- 
tion of the spirit of Katie King more than twenty times. 
I held her hands and kissed her." He created a great 
sensation by describing her beauty and loveliness. In a 
few davs he and Dr. Child attended another seance. The 



SPIRITUALISM. ng 

Katie King spirit was found to be the body of a young 
widow, who was concealed in a bolster in the bed. When 
this awful expose came, the mind of Dr. Owen reeled. 
He went insane and in a short time died a disappointed 
man. The Katie King seance was exposed in this coun- 
try and in England. 

All that there is in Spiritualism can be classed under 
three heads: (i) Fraud; (2) delusion; (3) a subjective 
force within the medium. Some people will tell you that 
they cannot be deceived. How foolish such a statement ! 
Who has not attended the entertainments of Kellar or 
Herrmann and seen them bewilder the entire audience 
for hours ? Under the electric light and in the presence 
of two thousand people, I saw Mr. Kellar take his place 
on a chair. He then said : "Watch me. I am going to 
spiritualize and then materialize." We watched. He 
began to fade away, he became a ghostly skeleton, then a 
mere shadow, a mist, and he was gone. Shortly we saw 
his form in outline, then his shadow, and finally he sat 
there as at the beginning. How did he do this ? I do not 
know. Two thousand people were deceived. 

The wizard Maro walked up to me once in the presence 
of fifteen hundred people. He said : "Count how many 
dollars I place in your hand." I counted ten. He said : 
"Would you swear there were ten ?" I said I was certain. 
To a gentleman by my side he said : "Take these dollars 
and drop them one by one upon the plate." Fifteen hun- 
dred people declared that there were ten. He then told 
the man to pick them up one by one, put them in his hand 
and close his hand over them. "Now, are you sure you 
have ten dollars in your hands?" "Yes." The wizard 
walked off twenty feet, took five other dollars from his 
pocket and threw them apparently, toward the man with 
the dollars. On opening his hands there were fifteen dollars 
in his hands. These men can deceive you all night. They 
cause flowers to bloom in your presence. They hold won- 
derful seances and spirit manifestations under the arc 



120 SPIRITUALISM. 

light. The fakirs of India surpass all Western perform- 
ers. Mr. Herrmann tells us that he saw a fakir step 
twenty feet away from him, fold his arms and sink into 
the ground. In a moment he came out of the ground. 
The attendant of Mr. H. saw the fakir standing all the 
time. This resembles a noted seance in New York, where 
part of the audience saw the medium floating in the air, 
while others saw her sitting in the cabinet. 

Again Mr. Herrmann tells us of a fakir who climbed a 
pole ; another man ran up the pole, took a sword and cut 
off the legs and arms of the man who had climbed up 
before him. The legless man fell to the ground, picked 
up his legs and arms, put them on and walked away. 
These wizards and sleight-of-hand men will deceive you 
for hours. They tell you there is no spirit in it. It is 
purely trickery. 

If these men who do not claim any spirit power can 
deceive you in the light of day, what may a Spiritualistic 
medium do in the dark seance? 

Hallucination performs a great part in these so-called 
spiritual manifestations. Men think they see things. Not 
all mediums are frauds. They are deluded. They think 
their vain imaginings are realities. Boastingly Spiritual- 
ists will say : "We know what we saw. You talk against 
us without seeing.' , Yes, but all Europe saw witches. 
Good men testified in court that they saw witches or old 
women fly down chimneys. Upon the evidence of these 
men, more truthful than any Spiritualist, thousands were 
put to death.- The insane man converses with his moth- 
er's spirit, sees her and handles her with his hands. The 
drunkard sees devils and hears the cries of spirits damned. 
The spirit medium sees the spirits of dead men. They 
all see through the subconscious mind. The hypnotized 
man sees angels, spirits, dogs or whatever is suggested 
to him. 

Dr. Carpenter, of Boston, hypnotized a young man 
who was a lover of Greek literature. In the hypnotic 



SPIRITUALISM. 121 

state Dr. C. said to him : "Would you like to have an 
interview with Socrates?" "Certainly, Dr. Carpenter, 
but Socrates is dead." "That is true, but he is here in 
spirit. Now, permit me to introduce you to Socrates." 
The young man bowed to the supposed person of Soc- 
rates. He assumed a serious tone of voice, asked ques- 
tions of Socrates and answered them himself in the lan- 
guage of the great teacher. For one hour he kept the 
audience in rapt admiration. Many were convinced that 
he was possessed of a spirit, while Dr. Carpenter ex- 
plained the manifestations. All that the young man had 
ever read of Socrates came before him. The subjective 
mind never forgets. 

We see this power manifested in religious frenzy. 
Some ignorant youth imagines the spirit is moving him. 
He is half-crazy. His subjective mind dominates. Every- 
thing he ever heard or read is now his for use. He begins 
his trance sermon and people call it spirit, because they 
have no other name for this unusual occurrence. Hyp- 
notized persons can sing and talk better than in normal 
condition. They can also see and hear more perfectly. 
The spirits seen and heard by mediums are the creations 
of their subjective minds. 

It is folly to declare that all things not understood are 
spirit manifestations. Hypnotism, telepathy, thought 
transference, mind reading and subjective memory have 
made plain many phenomena that were mysterious a few 
years ago. Who can explain the ways of the carrier 
pigeon? Put the pigeon in a dark cage, lock it in an 
express car, ship it away 500 miles, toss it into the air, 
and like a dart it will return to its home. What sense 
directed it? The next age will reveal to us more things 
than have been dreamed of in our philosophy. 

PSYCHIC FORCE). 

Twenty years ago the trance, telepathy, clairvoyance, 
hypnotism, clairaudience and the kinetic force were poorly 
understood. The mysterious and supernatural sur- 



122 SPIRITUALISM. 

*rounded these forces. Where these were not understood 
they were called spirit forces. To-day clairvoyance, clair- 
audience, telepathy, hypnotism and mind reading are rec- 
ognized as powers inherent in the mind of man. 

Let us define a few terms : 

Clairvoyance means clear seeing. In the clairvoyant 
state, hypnotic or mesmeric, subjects see better than in 
normal condition. In this state it is possible to read 
sealed letters, and to it may be attributed many of the 
mysteries of Spiritualism. Some psychics are able to 
read with the eyes closed or tightly bound. 

Clairaudience, clear hearing, is that faculty of the 
mind which enables the objective mind to communicate 
with the subjective mind without the agency of spoken 
words. Socrates thought he was watched over by a 
guardian spirit, which warned him in time of danger. 
Really, Socrates was talking to himself. His subjective 
mind could see and hear things not discernible by the 
objective. That these faculties do often give us warning 
can scarcely be denied. People have premonitions and 
think them supernatural, while it is only the subjective 
mind warning us of danger. Many mediums have this 
faculty largely developed. They really think they are 
talking with spirits, while they are simply conversing 
with themselves. 

Telepathy is the power of one subjective mind to com- 
municate with another subjective mind. It is the means 
of conveying information from one subjective mind to 
another. Telepathy, thought transference and mind read- 
ing belong exclusively to the subjective mind. The sub- 
jective mind may send a message to another subjective 
mind, and the message may not be lifted above the thresh- 
old of consciousness ; that is, a person in the subjective 
mind may send a message to another person and his sub- 
jective mind may receive the information. The recipient 
may not be in the subjective condition, hence not able to 
receive the message. 



SPIRITUALISM. 123 

The kinetic force is that power which enables the sub- 
jective entity, the spirit in man, to move objects without 
physical touch and to act without the aid of the senses — 
that is, independently of the body. Spiritualism began 
with the spirit-rapping phenomenon. Then spirit mate- 
rialization became prominent. After these things were 
explained to the mundane, they began to call up spirits 
to reveal the future. Mediums read sealed letters and 
tell us it is the power of the spirit. Science knows it is 
the power of the mind. The writer held a trunk check 
in his hand in such a manner that no one could see it 
except the man who was enrapport with a mind-reader, 
who was fifty feet from him. As soon as the man saw 
the check the mind-reader called out : "Trunk check, No. 
384." It was impossible for her to see the check. Go to 
the seance and the medium gives you a fair description of 
some departed friend. That is no evidence that she saw 
the spirit of your relative. She was in the subjective 
state — for all mediums are self-hypnotized. Your mind 
had the picture of your friend planted upon the subjective 
memory. The medium read your mind. Purely a case 
of thought transference — telepathy. In an Illinois town 
not long ago a lady came to me under much excitement. 
She had been to a seance and had conversed with her 
grandmother. The dear old lady wore the same blue cal- 
ico dress and small red shawl about her head. I asked 
her how she got the information. She said : "The me- 
dium told me there was an old lady present who wanted 
to talk to me, then gave an exact description of my grand- 
mother." Imagine a spirit coming back to this world 
attired in an old blue calico dress, with a red shawl 
around its head. The medium merely read the mind of 
the sitter. She gave the description and imagination did 
the rest. But, says someone, "the medium told me some- 
thing I was not thinking about. How could she read 
what was not in my mind?" Keep these things in mind: 

I. The subjective mind never forgets. 



124 SPIRITUALISM. 

2. The subjective mind remembers much that the ob- 
jective has forgotten. 

3. Telepathy is the power or force of the subjective 
mind. 

This medium, in the subjective state, went into the 
storehouse of your subjective mind and told you things 
there long forgotten. Generally they bring up trivial 
things we have not thought of for years. I met a man in 
California who said : "I think I met you once m Ladoga, 
Ind. My name is Olcott." I assured him I never knew 
a man by that name. He replied: "Do you remember 
having been at a country spelling-school, where the alarm 
of fire was given? The audience stampeded and you 
handed a little boy out of the window ?." I told him I re- 
membered the place very well. He replied : "Well, I 
am the boy." The name came back with the occurrence. 
He gave me a test. I had forgotten the occurrence. So 
the medium gathers some insignificant thing and gives 
you a test. She reads your mind. 

Another case may arise. The medium tells you some- 
thing that you do not know, and she did not know. The 
occurrence was unknown to both parties. Neither the 
sitter nor the medium possessed any knowledge of the 
matter. Yet she tells you about the occurrence. How 
did she get the information ? She says : "The spirit of 
the dead gave me this knowledge." In her self-hypnot- 
tized condition she may really think that is true. A 
short time ago the community was all excitement over the 
following occurrence: A ship was lost off the coast of 
New Jersey. On that ship was the mother of a young 
man living in a seaport town. He knew his mother was 
lost, but the body could not be found. He consulted a 
medium, who gave him this information : "Your mother 
was not drowned. I have a message from her. She says 
that in the wreck she was struck by a beam ; that her head 
was crushed, and that she died before the ship sank." 



SPIRITUALISM. i2S 

The next day the body was found and the head was 
crushed. 

There are two explanations : 

1. A mere guess of the medium. 

2. Telepathy. The mother was hurt. The first per- 
son that she would think of would be her son. She sent 
him a telepathic message, telling how she was injured. 
He, the son, not being a psychic, nor in the subjective 
state, his subjective mind received this telepathic mes- 
sage, but the information was not lifted up to conscious- 
ness. He consulted the medium, who went into the sub- 
jective. In this subjective state her subjective mind read 
his subjective mind and she gave him the message. It 
is important to remember that the subjective cannot com- 
mune with the objective. The subjective mind must send 
its message to the subjective. The medium says the 
spirit of the dead gave her the message information. 
What does that imply ? 

Here is a mother in sore distress. An anxious son 
seeking for the body of his mother. Some spirit sitting 
around idle, saw the mother hurt and fled over land and 
sea to tell this medium. By mere chance the son con- 
sulted this medium and received the information. What 
a silly old spirit ! Why did it not go to the son directly ? 
It is the old, old fad. If this is not a spirit, what is it? 
I don't know. Therefore, it is a spirit. Why should the 
spirit of a dead man be consulted ? Cannot a spirit of the 
living reveal as successfully as the dead? Many of the 
wonders that are supposed to come from disembodied 
spirits come from the spirit within the living. Your own 
spirit is a better monitor than the spirit of the dead. 
Every phenomenon of Spiritualism has been explained 
without resorting to supermundane influences. Rap- 
pings, table-turning, spirit photography, materialization, 
slate-writing, mind-reading and, indeed, every act of the 
Spiritualist has been duplicated by men who lay no claim 
to the supernatural. Irving Bishop read a sealed letter. 



126 SPIRITUALISM. 

He, blindfolded, read the number on a check. He made 
no claim to the communication from the dead. It was a 
psychic force within himself. The condition of the me- 
dium and the hypnotic subject is the same. Both are 
amenable to suggestion. The medium is self-hypnotized. 
In preparing to become a medium the learner is required 
to go into a dark room, go into the subjective condition 
and for twenty-four hours think of nothing only than 
that the spirits will come at his bidding. Auto-suggestion 
is all powerful to the medium. She looks for spirits, and 
in this exhausted condition she sees imaginary objects and 
calls them spirits of the dead. Any one can go through 
the same experience. Children cover their heads and in 
the dark see cats, dogs, bears and whatever they look for. 
In hypnotism we have oral suggestions. Tell the subject 
he sees the spirit of a departed friend and he sees it in his 
mind. Tell him he is a pig and he acts piggish. Sug- 
gestion can be given telepathically, one subjective mind 
to another ; or the suggestion may be the auto-suggestion, 
hypnotizing one's self, as the medium or the fakir. Ig- 
norance of the laws of suggestion has made converts to 
spiritualism. A confused person goes to the seance. He 
asks the medium to give him some test. The medium 
goes into a trance, and tells the sitter his name. This sur- 
prises him. Yet he is not a convert. He waits for a bet- 
ter test. The medium now tells him of the death of his 
father, and the manner of his burial. This startles him, 
yet he says, "perhaps she got my name from the hotel 
register, and read in my mind of father's death." He is 
not yet convinced of the genuineness of spiritualism. She 
now tells him of some trifling event of his boyhood. He 
cannot recall it. He leaves the seance, goes at once to his 
mother and asks about this boyhood prank. He finds it 
just as the medium had said. He is now a convert to 
spiritualism. All is easily explained. She reads his mind. 
All he ever knew was in his subjective mind. She entered 
this house and selected this little event. The medium 



SPIRITUALISM. 127 

herself may think that a spirit gave her this information, 
when it was only her sub-conscious mind. All this is 
plain to men who think, yet most men do not think. The 
lazy man avoids the labor of thinking, by declaring that 
all mystical manifestations are the caprices of the spirits. 
The best psychics are persons in ill health. Imagination 
is more pronounced in the sick, hypnotic, and the insane 
than in persons in normal condition. The London Society 
of Research, The Seybert Commission, Prof. Hudson and 
the great scientists of psychic study declare that this sub- 
jective entity or soul can communicate otherwise than 
through the senses. Let this telekinetic force be thor- 
oughly proved and spirit communication must be aband- 
oned. Some scientists affirm that the soul of man may 
create a phantasm that can be seen. The dreamy phil- 
osopher of the Orientals is finding followers in our coun- 
try. Theosophy is warmed over Hindooism. 

There is no proof that any departed spirit ever came 
to communicate with men. All the proof rests with the 
spiritualists. "Margaret Fox said : "I do not know this 
manifestation to be the spirit of a dead man. It may be 
the spirit of the living, or it may be a recreated spirit." 
Many leading spiritualists admit that they cannot tell 
whether the communication is from a good or a bad 
spirit. That bad spirits personate the good. We know 
they are not good spirits. Your mother's spirit would 
tell you the truth. Any spirit medium will tell falsehoods 
if you deceive her. When you call up the spirit of your 
mother ask the medium a few questions like these : 

1. Are you happy? Yes. 

2. Is my departed sister with you? Yes. 

The fact is you never had a sister. You lead the 
medium wrong. She answered your questions according 
to your leading. Of all the people that Jesus and the 
apostles called from the grave not one even mentions any- 
thing beyond. Paul tells us it is not lawful to tell what 
is on the other side of the river of death. 



128 SPIRITUALISM. 

The Witch of Endor. I Samuel 28:7-25. The one 
great proof text that the disembodied spirits converse 
with the living is found in the Witch of Endor. Spirit- 
ualists constantly refer to this model seance. I do not 
see how spiritualism can find any encouragement here. 
She was a criminal worthy of death. God has condemned 
all these deceivers. That this witch was similar to the 
mediums of this day, I freely grant. She was nothing 
more than a medium, a fortuneteller. Then as now she 
was a deceiver and a fraud. Look into the history of the 
case. Samuel was dead, Saul was sore pressed by the 
enemy ; God had departed from him. He could not get 
a communication from him (God) through dreams or a 
prophet ; his sins had caused God to reject him ; Saul had 
put these vile deceivers to death because God had com- 
manded it. Under this great storm and stress Saul con- 
sulted one of these very women whom God had con- 
demned. The witch asked whom she should bring up. 
Saul said Samuel. Saul was disguised, but she recognized 
him (by his partially visible form or by mind reading) 
and was alarmed ; Saul assured her he would protect her. 
She continued the seance ; she announced that some one 
was coming out of the earth ; (not down from heaven or 
Ramah) ; she said this being was an old man with a 
mantle ; just as she had seen Samuel, for he lived only 
eight miles away. Her subjective mind reproducing the 
image of Samuel. Saul perceived it was Samuel, not by 
sight, but from the description given by the woman, and 
Saul supposed it was Samuel, and the Bible speaks of this 
personation as a fact. The divine writer continued to re- 
cord the appearance as it seemed unto Saul and the trance 
medium. A close examination of the occurrence will con- 
vince anyone that the spirit of Samuel had nothing to do 
with the affair. Samuel was not there in his disembodied 
spirit for the following reasons : Immortal souls do not 
come up out of the ground wrapped in a mantle. 2. A 
soul as brave as Samuel would not be disturbed. 



SPIRITUALISM. 129 

This is an old fad of mediums. They must have proper 
conditions or the timid spirits will flee. What nonsense. 
Think of the spirit of Napoleon, who when living swayed 
the destinies of hations, played with kings and popes and 
led legions to victory, being intimidated because some 
skeptic attended a seance. 3. Samuel was a holy prophet. 
He would not come at the bidding of the wicked woman, 
that God had condemned. 4. God would not cafl him up, 
because He had refused to commune with Saul. 5. The 
Devil could not bring him up. 

Now if Samuel of his own accord would not heed the 
call of the wicked witch, the Lord did not call him back, 
and the Devil could not do it, the spirit of Samuel had 
nothing to do with this seance. Still this is a fine case of 
ancient spiritualism. Those witches, wizards, necro- 
mancers, and divisers of the olden times were condemned 
to death. Suffer not a witch to live ! There were enemies 
to the country and traitors to the Lord. They are danger- 
ous to society now. 

Spiritualists have gone on deceiving and being de- 
ceived. They reason as foolishly as Dr. Owen and the 
witch finders. Major Premise : "Every thing we cannot 
explain is produced by the spirits of the dead." Minor 
Premise : "We cannot explain the seance. Conclusion : 
"Therefore the manifestations of the seance are produced 
by the spirits of the dead." 

THE PROMISES OF SPIRITUALISTS A FAILURE. 

Spiritualism made its appearance with the boast that 
the day of reformation had come. It posed as an angel 
of light. It claimed to be the second coming of Christ. 
It claimed to be the saviour of humanity, the eradicator 
of evils and the promoter of good. It was to reform so- 
ciety and regenerate man. Has spiritualism made good 
her claims ? From its birth fraud has been its main sup- 
port. Without trickery and deception, it would never 
have gone out of Hydesville. 

Three times the Fox girls were exposed and finally in 



130 SPIRITUALISM. 

1888 they confessed that they made the spirit rappings 
with their toes, ankles and knees. When I made this 
statement in Carrolton, Mo., physicians declared this im- 
possible. In this town where I lectured I met Mrs. 
Nettie Bear of DeWitt, Mo. In the presence of Rev. E. 
H. Kellar of Carrolton and C. E. Wagner, she demon- 
strated that she could make these raps not only with her 
ankles and toes, but with her shoulders as well. 

In 1847 the Katie King seance was exposed in the 
presence of Dr. Owen. This expose drove Dr. Owen 
insane. In 1876 Anna Steward was exposed in Terre 
Haute, Ind. Every Spiritualistic journal prior to the 
exposure declared her to be one of the best mediums in 
this country. Hull, Jameson, and Judge Edmonds affirm 
that nearly every medium of importance has been ex- 
posed. Mediums as a rule have two careers, one as a 
spirit medium, then when they are exposed, they start 
out lecturing on the exposure of all mediums. The 
Spiritualistic Journal in 1877 exposed the photographic 
spirit fraud of Mrs. Blanchard. Dr. Slade, the slate- 
writing medium performed before the crowned heads of 
Europe. In 1876 he was exposed. Dr. Childs discovered 
that the Katie King spirit was Mrs. Holmes. The Ben- 
netts were marvels, but were exposed and then went about 
exposing others. Mr. Holme, the greatest medium in 
the history of spiritualism, said: "I doubt if there be 
five materializing mediums that have not been caught in 
perpetrating some fraud." 

Mrs. Blavatsky, the founder of Theosophy, was twice 
exposed as a fraud. Spiritualism is immoral and dan- 
gerous to the young. Its tendency is toward free-love. 
Fifty years ago their lectures proclaimed the doctrine of 
free love. Andrew Jackson Davis wrecked a happy 
family in his affinity hunting. Leo Miller says every 
desire of the passions is a righteous desire. Dr. A. B. 
Child wrote a book. All spiritualists accepted the 
book as good doctrine. Here are some of its statements : 



SPIRITUALISM. 131 

"Whatever is is right" "Whatever desire there is, good 
or so-called bad, is a natural desire of trie soul. Vice as 
well as virtue is beautiful. Both are right." Leo Miller 
practiced what he preached and induced Mattie Strick- 
land to leave her parents and follow him. The spiritual- 
istic convention at Rock Island, 111., 1886, declared 
"There is no such thing as moral obligation. Vice is as 
good as virtue." 

Victoria Woodhull, whose advocacies of free love be- 
came too indecent to be endured by the state authorities, 
became president of the National Spiritual Association. 
Six of the editors of spiritualistic papers, and that is 
about all of them, are free-lovers. The Crucible is edited 
by Moses Hull, who published the fact that he is living 
with Mattie Sawyer without marriage. Mr. Hull by 
way of defense says : "We hold damning facts about 
nearly all of the spiritualist lecturers." The editor had 
gathered these facts to prove that the other editors were 
as deep in the mire of free-loveism as he. He openly con- 
fesses his free-loveism. The records he published are too 
debasing to print here. In 1877 he advocated the abroga- 
tion of the marriage relation and free promiscuous rela- 
tions of the sexes. Free-love is free lust. Hear the testi- 
mony of those who have tasted the fruits of spiritualism. 

Dr. B. P. Randolph, author of a work "Dealings with 
the Dead," was eight years a medium. He gives his 
opinion of it in the following scathing words : 

"I enter the arena as the champion of common sense, against 
what in my soul I believe to be the most tremendous enemy of 
God, morals and religion that ever found foothold on the earth ; — 
the most seductive, hence the most dangerous, form of sensualism 
that ever cursed a nation, age or people. I was a medium about 
eight years, during which time I made three thousand speeches, 
and traveled over several different countries, proclaiming its 
new gospel. I now regret that so much excellent breath was 
wasted, and that my health of mind and body was well nigh 
ruined. I have only begun to regain both since I totally aban- 
doned it, and to-day had rather see the cholera in my house than 
be a spiritual medium. 



132 SPIRITUALISM. 

"As a trance speaker I became widely known, and now aver 
that during the entire eight years of my mediumship I firmly and 
sacredly confess that I had not the control of my own mind, as 
I now have, one-twentieth of the time ; and before man and high 
heaven I most solemnly declare that I do not now believe that 
during the whole eight years I was sane for thirty-six consecu- 
tive hours, in consequence of the trance and the susceptibility 
thereto. 

"For seven years I held daily intercourse with what purported 
to be my mother's spirit. I am now fully persuaded that it was 
nothing but an evil spirit, an infernal demon, who, in that guise, 
gained my soul's confidence and led me to the very brink of ruin. 
We read in Scripture of demoniac possession, as well as abnormal 
spiritual action. Both facts exist, provable to-day ; I am positive 
the former does. A. J. Davis and his clique of Harmonialists 
say there are no evil spirits. I emphatically deny the statement. 
Five of my friends destroyed themselves, and I attempted it, by 
direct spiritual influences. Every crime in the calendar has been 
committed by mortal movers of viewless beings. Adultery, for- 
nication, suicides, desertions, unjust divorces, prostitution, abor- 
tion, insanity are not evils, I suppose. I charge all these to this 
scientific Spiritualism. It has also broken up families, squan- 
dered fortunes, tempted and destroyed the weak. It has ban- 
ished peace from happy families, separated husbands and wives, 
and shattered the intellect of thousands." 

Prof . T. J. Hudson, one of the most careful writers, 
says: 

"I do not charge Spiritualists as a class with being advocates 
of the doctrines of free love. On the contrary, I am aware that, 
as a class, they hold the marriage relation in sacred regard. I 
cannot forget, however, that but a few years ago some of their 
leading advocates and mediums proclaimed the doctrine of free 
love in all its hideous deformity from every platform in the land. 
The moral virus took effect here and there all over the country, 
and it is doing its deadly work in secret in many an otherwise 
hapny home. And / charge a large and constantly growing class 
of professional mediums with being the leading propagandists 
of the doctrine of free love. They infest every community in the 
land, and it is well known to all men and women who are dis- 
satisfied or unhappy in their marriage relations, that they can 
always find sympathy by consulting the average medium, and can, 
moreover, find justification for illicit love by invoking the spirits 
of the dead through such mediums." 

To the young the danger from mediums is appalling. 
Notice the prayers of the spiritualist : 

On the 8th of December, 1861, Miss Lizzie Doten, one of the 
most popular spirit mediums in America, at a meeting in Lyceum 



SPIRITUALISM. 133 

Hall, Boston, offered the following Spiritualistic prayer to Satan : 
"O Lucifer, thou Son of the Morning, who fell from thy high 
estate, and whom mortals are prone to call the embodiment of 
evil, we lift our voices unto Thee. We know thou canst not 
harm us unless by the will of the Almighty, of whom thou art a 
part and portion, and in whose economy thou playest a part, and 
we cannot presume to sit in judgment over Diety. From the 
depths of thine infamy streams forth divine truths. Why should 
we turn from thee? Does not the same inspiration rule us all? 
Is one in God's sight better than another?" 

Prof. W. Chaney, in San Jose, Cal, prayed : "O Devil, 
Prince of the Christians' hell, hear my prayer." 

The following is an extract from the writings of J. F. 
Whitney, editor of the New York Pathfinder : 

"Now, after a long and constant watchfulness, seeing for 
months and for years its progress and its practical working upon 
its devotees, its believers, and its mediums, we are compelled to 
speak our honest conviction, which is, that the manifestations 
coming through the acknowledged mediums, who are designated 
as rapping, tipping, writing and entranced mediums, have a bane- 
ful influence upon believers, and create discord and confusion ; 
that the generality of these teachings inculcate false ideas, ap- 
prove of selfish individual acts, and indorse theories and princi- 
ples which, when carried out, debase and make men little better 
than the brute." 

Dr. Hatch, one of the husbands of the famed medium 
Cora Hatch, at one time a spiritualist himself, says : 

"The extensive opportunity I have had, and that, too, among 
the first class of Spiritualists, of learning its nature and results, 
I think will enable me to lay just claims to being a competent 
witness in this matter. I have heard much of the improvements 
in individuals, in consequence of a belief in Spiritualism. With 
such I have no acquaintance. But I have known many whose 
integrity of character and uprightness of purpose rendered them 
worthy examples of all around, who, on becoming mediums, and 
giving up their individuality, also gave up every sense of honor 
and decency. There are thousands of high-minded and intelli- 
gent Spiritualists who will agree with me that there is no slander 
in saying that the inculcation of no doctrines in the country has 
ever shown such disastrous moral and social results as the spir- 
itual theories. * * * Iniquities which have justly received 
the condemnation of centuries are openly upheld, vices which 
would destroy any wholesome regulation of society are crowned 
as virtues, prostitution is believed to be fidelity to self, marriage 



134 SPIRITUALISM. 

an outrage on freedom, bastards claimed to be spiritually begot- 
ten J * * * The abrogation of marriage ; bigamy, theft, rapes, 
are all chargeable to Spiritualism. I most solemnly affirm that I 
do not believe that there has arisen a class of people who are 
guilty oi so great a variety of crimes and indecencies as the Spir- 
itualists of America. Spiritualism and prostitution, with a re- 
jection of Christianity, are twin sisters. I have been able, with 
but little inquiry, to count up seventy mediums, most of whom 
have wholly abandoned their conjugal relations; others living 
with paramours called 'affinities,' others in promiscuous adultery, 
and still others exchanged partners." — D. B. F. Hatch, from Spir- 
itualism Unveiled. 

The spiritualists in convention in Chicago resolved : 

i. That no charges may be made against members. 

2. That any person without regards to morals, could 
become a member. 

If we did not know that spiritualism was the outcome 
of fraud, delusion and the psychic force, we would be 
driven, on account of its debaucheries, to believe that the 
Devil himself was the originator of this debasing system. 

No woman who prizes her honor will become a medium 
or a medium visitor. 

Disappointment, heartache, shame and suicide are the 
results of seance visits. No medium can help you. Medi- 
ums can and do pollute those who confide in them. 
Spiritualism ruins health, debases the mind, blasts the 
character and damns the soul. If you would gain heaven, 
shun spiritualists. 



CHAPTER IX. 

MENTAL MEDICINE VS. DIVINE HEALING. 

Before discussing Christian Science, divine healing, 
faith cure and kindred subjects, it will be important to 
examine the history of mental healing. In all ages and 
among all people the sick have been healed without medi- 
cine. These cures have been performed by pagan, hea- 
then, Mohammedan, Mormon, Catholic, Protestant, athe- 
ist, infidel and Christian with equal success. The means 
used to cure the afflicted were charms, incantations, 
prayer, laying on of hands, relics, bones of saints, king's 
touch, beating the tum-tum drum, bathing in sacred foun- 
tains, and remedies too numerous to record here. 

The Christian can claim no pre-eminence over the Hin- 
doo. Mormon, Adventist and Spiritualist had performed 
wonderful cures long before the modern cults had ex- 
istence. 

Before Christ came to this earth, back in the mountains 
of Thibet was a stagnant pool that superstition declared 
contained healing properties. People came for thousands 
of miles, drank this water, threw down their crutches, 
tore off their bandages and went home rejoicing. 

Emperor Vespasian cured the lame and blind by touch- 
ing the patient with his toe. Emperor Hadrian cured the 
afflicted by the touch of his fingers. The touch of the 
king cured the king's evil. Charles II touched 100,000 
persons. King James, in one journey through England, 
by mere touch of the hand cured 800. Valentine Great- 
rakes in Cork, Liverpool and London cured multitudes 
by the touch of his hands. But finally the patients be- 
came so numerous he treated them by gazing upon them. 

All the wonderful cures are not confined to modern 
healers. A count in Germany cured many of stammering 
by kissing. The medicine men of the Indians expelled 



136 MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

disease from the wigwam. St. Patrick healed the blind 
and lame by imposition of hands. 

History tells us that in 1625 the soldiers of William 
of Orange were dying with the scurvy. The prince knew 
the power of the mind in healing disease. He had his 
physician go into the shut-up quarantined city and tell 
the soldiers that the Prince had secured a wonderful 
medicine, and that a few drops would cure any one. They 
believed the Prince, took the medicine and were cured. 
He gave them nothing save a little wormwood and col- 
ored water. The medicine of course was worthless, but 
it not only cured the individual, but a pestilence was 
abated. 

Saint Bernard is* said to have restored sight to eleven 
blind persons, and healed eighteen lame in one day. The 
missionaries tell us that pagan priests healed by sorcery. 

A party of young people on their way home from a 
revival meeting imagined they saw Jesus in Knock 
Chapel, in Ireland, an old abandoned church house. He 
told them to eat pieces of mortar of the old mud house and 
be healed. The afflicted come from afar, eat the mortar, 
throw away their crutches, and return cured. This 
chapel is full of crutches and bandages that have been 
tossed away by the sick. Lowell tells us enough mud 
had been eaten to make four such chapels. 

Were there any curative properties in this mortar ? Cer- 
tainly not. It was mental medicine that healed them. 

In 1858, a peasant girl of Lourdes in France, thought 
she saw the Virgin Mary come out of the water of a 
grotto. The Virgin bestowed curative properties upon 
this water, and gave out that all who drank of it would be 
healed. Many people claimed to be healed, but the climax 
was reached when in 1876 thirty-five cardinals and a 
hundred high church officers consecrated a church built 
over the grotto. Many people, and especially Catholics, 
came here, drank and went home cured. Many bathe 
in the water and are healed. To deny this is to deny all 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 137 

history. Dr. J. M. Buckley visited this grotto. He saw 
hundreds drink and improve in health. Were there any 
curative properties in the mud of Knock Chapel or the 
waters of Lourdes? No. What cured these people? It 
was mental medicine, mind cure. About 1800, Mesmer 
startled both continents with what seemed to be miracu- 
lous cures. He called his system magnetism, afterwards 
animal magnetism. At first he healed the sick by strok- 
ing the diseased body with magnets. He claimed after 
a while that he could magnetize (hypnotize) his subjects 
by stroking them with his hands. "He healed the sick, 
caused the lame to walk, and the blind to see." Leleuze 
added to this mesmeric power suggestion, and scores were 
healed. The sick came from all parts of the continent. 
The fame of Mesmer became world wide. No healer of 
this century, let him or her be of the school of Christian 
Science or faith cure, has approached anything like the 
success of the mesmerizers of France. Was there any 
virtue in the magnets of Mesmer? No. Mind did the 
healing. To deny that thousands were healed is to deny 
the evidence of millions who have witnessed these cures. 
Mesmer never claimed to have any divine power. Mrs. 
Ellen White and other Adventists in 1857 claimed that 
they healed the sick by prayer and application of hands, 
in Connecticut they tried to bring a dead girl to life. 
They prayed all night, and refused to bury her until de- 
cay began. Today hypnotism is doing wonderful things. 
Remember there is a dual mind, subjective and ob- 
jective; that the subjective is amenable to control by 
suggestion. Hypnotize persons and tell them they are 
sick and they will get sick. They believe your suggestion. 
Hypnotism is now in general use among up-to-date phy- 
sicians. Dentistsi hypnotize patients and extract the 
teeth ; surgeons hypnotize patients and amputate a hand 
or a foot. A surgeon in London but a few months ago 
hypnotized a patient, put him in the cataleptic condition, 
and cut off his leg. The man did not flinch. The writer 



138 MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

ran a needle through a lady's hand while she was hyp- 
notized and she did not wince, yet she was controlled by a 
whisper from the operator. Nervous afflictions, bad hab- 
its, drunkenness and serious ailments are cured daily by 
hypnotic treatment. Mental medicine has become a sci- 
ence. 

Dr. Bramwell of Scotland, gives this case: "In 1890 
a lawyer thirty-four years of age, came to me for treat- 
ment. His health had failed and he had become a chronic 
invalid. He was afflicted with nervous prostration, dys- 
pepsia, fever, and once attempted suicide. He had the 
best medical treatment possible. I hypnotized him and 
treated him daily. He in one month was cured, and now 
is robust and cheerful. " The reader must understand 
that in the hypnotic state the operator can converse with 
his patient. In this state, the doctor suggests to him that 
he is getting better, that he can eat heartily when he w'akes 
up, that his circulation will be better. All this he believes 
while in the hypnotic state. By post-hypnotism he is 
healed, his subjective mind remembers the suggestion and 
carries it out. 

Voisin, a famous Paris physician, writes: "A woman 
whose arms had been paralyzed for six months, her fin- 
gers were shut so tight that her nails had made wounds 
in her hands. I hypnotized her, and told her to open her 
hands. This she did, and I then commanded her to move 
her arms and she moved them easily. In a few treatments 
she was well." The writer saw Dr. W. E. Harlow hyp- 
notize a young man who was addicted to cigarette smok- 
ing. In the hypnotic condition he told the young man 
that if he ever smoked again it would make him sick. He 
had the subject to repeat: "If I smoke it will make me 
very sick. I will vomit." The next day when he lighted 
his cigarette he became sick instantly and vomited. He 
gave up the habit of smoking. Anyone can experiment. 
Reread the chapter in this book on hypnotism. Sug- 
gestive therapeutics and hypnotism are removing the 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 139 

healing of disease from the realm of supernatural and 
mystical. We know the mind can make sick. You see 
a mangled body, it makes you sick. The mother hears 
of the death of a child and she faints. In great sorrow 
comes the cold perspiration. You swallow a glass of 
water. Some one tells you it is poison, and you vomit. 
What made one get sick, another faint, and another 
vomit? The mind sets up a chemical process. Why 
does a lady blush? The mind drives the blood to the 
cheek. A harsh word has killed, an angry word sets 
a man on fire. 

There is not an organ in the body but what can be ex- 
cited by thought. All admit that all these things are the 
results of the mind. If the mind can make sick, can it 
not cure? If a fright may stop the beating of the heart 
and cause death, cannot a kind and soothing word in- 
crease the circulation and relieve suffering? If the mind 
can cause pain, it can also relieve pain. Mind has killed 
many. Convicts have died thinking they were bleeding 
to death, when in fact only a little warm water was pass- 
ing over the supposed cut in the leg. 

Imagination has cured and killed thousands. Know- 
ing these things, why relegate them to the regions of the 
mysterious, and call them divine? Healing is not a re- 
ligion, but a science. The cures wrought by the Chris- 
tian Scientist, Faith Healer, or Dowie can be easily du- 
plicated by the hypnotist, and mental science. Christian 
Science and the divine healers can not lay claim to 
greater wonders than can the patent medicine vender, the 
fakir or the mesmerizer. Does anyone believe that the 
waters of Lourdes, the mud of Knock Chapel, or magnet 
of Mesmer had any curative value? Yet crutches and 
bandages fill the chapel as witnesses that the owners were 
healed. 

Every case of Christian Science and Dowie healing can 
be paralleled by those who do not claim supernatural 
power. 



i 4 o MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

Does Dowie cure the fever? So does the magnetic 
healer. Does the Christian Scientist cure rheumatism? 
So does the Indian Medicine Man. Literature is full of 
quack medicine healers. They have testimonies as valu- 
able as any of the Scientists. In reading of the wonder- 
ful cures of these so-called divine healers two things 
should be kept in mind : 

1. In nearly all of these reports in the literature of 
these healers are exaggerations. 

2. That real cures have been duplicated by the mind 
healers. 

Dr. Schofield, who has investigated this subject, speaks 
as follows in reference to Christian Science and kindred 
cults : 

"After a careful examination and inquiry, I have failed 
to find a single organic cure. The faith healer publishes 
the cure of consumption, tumors and diphtheria, but in all 
my searching I have failed to find one single case. I find 
on investigation that the cases greatly exaggerated are of 
a nervous nature." 

Every case reported correctly can be paralleled by the 
mind healer, the regular physician or the hypnotic. 

Case I. While in California a lady said to me: "I 
know I was divinely healed. I was a cripple going on a 
crutch. I went to hear a lecturer on Divine Healing. 
When the lecture was over he came to me and said, 'God 
does not want you to walk on a crutch ; drop your crutch, 
give me your hands and walk to me.' I did so, and he 
then told me to trust God, leave my crutch, and go home. 
I took my husband by the arm and walked home. I have 
never used my crutch since. I know I was divinely 
healed." Parallel : In the same town, a young man was 
crippled in a wreck. He went on two crutches. He 
secured the position as a cattle herder. One beautiful 
afternoon he tied his crutches on his saddle, got off his 
pony and lay down under the shade of the trees. A pass- 
ing train stampeded the herd of 10,000 cattle. The cat- 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 141 

tie started toward the crippled man ; his pony ran off with 
his crutches, and in a moment he would have been 
trampled to pieces unless he escaped. Forgetting that 
he was crippled he sprang up, and ran a mile over the 
hills. He never used crutches after this occurrence. 
Now, the first was divine healing, and the second bovine 
healing. There was as much God in one as the other. It 
was the mind controlling these feeble bodies. 

Case 2. Mrs. Eddy tells that a Mr. Clark in Lynn 
was near death's door. She says : "I went to his bed. 
In ten minutes he opened his eyes and said, 'I feel like a 
new man/ " Duplicate : The writer sat by the bed of 
what all supposed to be a dying woman. For weeks she 
had been a helpless invalid. She could not turn herself 
in the bed. Instantly she became a raving maniac. She 
sprang out of the bed with an activity that was alarming. 
Two strong men caught her, but with almost superhuman 
strength she tossed them against the wall as if they had 
been pigmies. In a few moments she gained control of 
her mind, looked confused, and said : "How did I get 
out here?" She never took her bed again, and soon 
gained her strength and health. What gave her this 
power? That sub-conscious mind, entity, that inward 
soul, executed these wonderful performances. 

Case 3. The Christian Science Journal tells us that 
one of the patients of a leading healer had lost the power 
of speech. The healer reasoned with her, and she spoke. 
Duplicate : I was to deliver the annual address before a 
college graduating class. When I arose in the morning I 
was too hoarse to speak. What must I do ? The students 
depended upon me. I decided to resort to quinine ; went to 
a drug friend and asked him for 25 cents' worth of two- 
grained capsules. I went to my room and began to take 
the capsules every fifteen minutes. In two hours my 
cold was breaking ; I could talk some, and I was wet with 
perspiration. I became alarmed and told my attendant 
to examine the capsules and see if there were two grains 



142 MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

in them. On examination the capsules were found to be 
empty. The druggist thought I wanted to fill the cap- 
sules myself. I had taken no quinine, but my cold was 
cured, and I delivered my address. What gave me and 
the case reported above, the power to speak? The mind. 
There was no more virtue in the empty capsules than 
there was in the theory of the Christian Scientist. 

Case 4. Dr. Dowie tells us a man came to see him 
with eyesight almost gone. He prayed and the man could 
see. Parallel: About one year ago, an old man went 
blind in the Union Depot in Indianapolis. He came to 
the depot to go to the country. He gave up, and was 
led to the waiting room. An osteopathic physician placed 
his hands upon the neck of the old man, and manipulated 
his head and eyes. In twenty minutes his sight came 
back. Let Dowie or the Divine Healer have this case 
and it will be proclaimed a divine cure. Years ago, I was 
out squirrel hunting with a man who had lost the power 
of speech. My gun was heavily loaded. A bird flew over 
us, and I told him to shoot it. He fired, and the gun 
kicked him off the fence. He jumped up, and in audible 
language cursed the old gun. After that operation he 
talked freely. This was certainly not divine healing. 
When I related my experience with the empty capsules 
in a lecture at Lorain, O., two sisters were much amused. 
They came to me and told me this story: "The nurse 
prepared some capsules for the two sisters who were 
sick, one was cured, and the other was made sick with the 
nasty bitter quinine. By mistake they had taken the 
empty capsules." 

Case 5. Mrs. Eddy claims she cured a man in Cin- 
cinnati by absent treatment. Parallel : In South Chicago 
a lady had a serious case of heart trouble. The physicians 
told her that her case was probably hopeless. She sent 
her husband to see the Christian Science doctor. The 
healer told the husband that he could cure her by absent 
treatment, and that if he would go home and select an 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 143 

hour he would pray and she must pray, and only think 
of being healed. He also informed the husband that 
the wife must dress loosely and be very quiet. His wife 
selected 8 p. m. the next day. The husband was a travel- 
ing man, and the next morning started to tell the healer 
to treat his wife at 8 p. m., but he found he could not 
stop off and make the train that he wanted. He did not 
see the healer. That night the wife robed herself, went 
into the subjective condition, and meditated upon being 
healed. Of course, she thought the doctor was praying 
for her, but he knew nothing about it, but that did not 
matter. The next day she wrote her husband that she 
was much improved. The third day she arose, dressed 
and went about her work. The fourth day she wrote to 
her husband at Aurora: "I am well. I am a convert to 
Christian Science." He came home that night. The 
joke was too good to keep. He told her that he did not 
see the doctor. She relapsed and died in ten hours. 

Case 6. The Divine Healer publishes to the world that 
God through him has cured drunkards of the appetite for 
drink. Duplicate: A lady came to the hospital in In- 
dianapolis for treatment for the habit of opium eating. 
The president of the medical college said to her: "Cer- 
tainly we can cure you. We have these cases every 
week." She was half cured then. The president in- 
formed the faculty that he would treat the lady entirely 
by suggestion. He said to her : "You must try to sleep 
without taking opium, but if you cannot sleep you must 
take it in the dissolved form." She tossed upon her bed 
till midnight. It took two men to control her. At mid- 
night she took a spoonful of dissolved opium, and in 
fifteen minutes she sank to rest. The ninth night she 
slept without taking the drug. The president then told 
her she must decrease the dose daily. At the end of 
thirty days the appetite left her, and she paid her bills and 
went home well. The president and the faculty say that 
they did not give her any opiate, but she thought she took 



i 4 4 MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

opium, and the subjective mind told her to go to sleep, 
and she obeyed. Dr. Bernheim gives the following: "A 
lady came to me for treatment. She could not speak a 
word, not even a whisper. On examining her vocal 
cords, I found no defect. The reason she did not talk 
was because (like a baby) she did not know how. She 
imagined she could not speak. I informed her that 1 
could readily cure her. I told her electricity would cure 
all cases like hers. Ordering my assistant to bring in 
the strongest battery, I prepared to treat her merely by 
suggestive therapeutics. I put the pallet of the instru- 
ment on her tongue and was just ready to put the prongs 
on her throat, when I thought of suggestion. Instead of 
the fork on her throat, I put my two fingers. She heard 
the noise of the machine and saw the electric sparks, and 
in her imagination she thought she felt a current, al- 
though there was no circuit. I pressed my fingers tightly 
on her throat and loosened them quickly, and said to her, 
'Do you not feel better?' She nodded yes. I pressed still 
harder and asked once more if she was not easy. She 
replied in the affirmative nod (being half choked of course 
she would feel better when relieved). I then ordered 
the attendant to put on a full current, pressed her throat 
and said quickly, 'What is your name?' she replied with- 
out a moment's hesitancy 'Mary.' I told her she was 
perfectly well. She had no more trouble in talking." 
Give such a case as that to Dowie, Christian Scientist, or 
Faith Healer, and it would be heralded over the land as 
miraculous. Dr. Bernheim is the author of that mar- 
velous work, "Suggestive Therapeutics." Dr. John 
Wood, of London, says he has cured over one thousand 
by hypnotic suggestion, and these cases were not only 
nervous disorders, but that he successfully treated rheu- 
matism, heart trouble and fevers. Dr. Myers reports 
the following case : The patient was a paralytic woman 
thirty-five years of age. Dr Myers says: "She was 
unable to turn in her bed. She remained in one position 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 145 

until helped. She ate but very little. She had given up 
all hope of recovery." At this stage in her affliction the 
noted Professor Buchanan, of Glasgow, was called to 
examine the case. He says: "I went to her bedside and 
said to her, 'I can treat you if you will do what I tell you 
to do. Turn over and let me examine your back.' She 
turned without any assistance. I commanded her to arise, 
get out of bed, and walk. I gave her my hand. She arose 
and walked across the room to the surprise of her hus- 
band and sister. She ate a hearty meal, and I left the 
house having performed a cure that some would have 
called miraculous." 

We are now prepared to draw the following conclu- 
sions : 

SUMMARY. 

First. In the past, the curative power of the mind over 
the body has been largely overlooked ; that mental medi- 
cine has never received the attention that its importance 
deserved ; that wonderful cures have been wrought by the 
mind cannot be denied. 

Facts show that the mind can induce sickness. If the 
mind can induce disease, it can exert an influence to check 
disease. The relation between the body and mind 
is closer than we have supposed. If mind 

causes disease, it can cure the disease it causes. We 
have found, beyond doubt, that the mind is a curative 
agent. No physician of merit claims that he can cure 
disease. His medicine merely assists nature. What is 
it to assist nature? It is mental energy that assists na- 
ture. There can be no pain without mind. There can 
be no cure without mind. When any part of the body is 
attacked, information of that fact is immediately carried 
to the central office — the mind. This central intelligence 
at once issues orders to protect the part of the body in 
danger. While the mind is the great source of intelli- 
gence, there are subordinate intelligencies. The best oi 
physicians admit that the spinal cord, the nerves, and the 



146 MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

cells of the body possess subordinate intelligence. When 
the finger is hurt, the cell that is injured carries the in- 
formation at once to headquarters. Through the cells, sug- 
gestions can be made to the mind ; hence, when the mother 
places her hands upon the body of the child she exerts a 
healing influence. She carries out a medical principle. 
The cells of her hands carry a soothing influence to the 
body cells of the child. This intelligence is carried to 
the central office, where orders are given for the child to 
sleep. The child obeys this suggestion and sinks to 
quiet sleep. Who cannot recall the soothing influence of 
the sympathetic touch of "mother's hand?" 

Second. While suggestion is a potent influence in 
healing disease, it has its limits. If a thorn is in the foot, 
suggestion will not pull it out. Faith healing will not 
set a broken bone nor replace a dislocated joint. Mate- 
rial remedies are essential, surgeons are valuable. Mate- 
rial remedies may be potent to suggest to the mind. To 
pray for God to set a broken leg, and refuse to call a 
surgeon, out of prejudice, is criminal. If medicine cures 
and the healer refuses to give it, and his patient dies, he is 
guilty of manslaughter. The name of religion should not 
be used to screen the healer from guilt. All schools of 
faith-healers, Christian Science, divine healers and Dowie- 
ites agree in one thing — to hate the medical profession 
with an unappeasable hatred, and to denounce all other 
systems but their own. Dowie hurls defiance at the 
Christian Scientists, while Mrs. Eddy declares all other 
systems are frauds or imitation. Nearly all systems of 
healing have some merit. Magnetic healing has merit, 
but it is not the only system. The same is true of the 
medical profession. One system of medicine antagonizes 
all other systems. That there are curative properties in 
drugs need not be denied. Food builds up the emaciated 
body. The cells of the body are fed by medicine. They 
often need a stimulus. The science of medicine must be 
recognized and encouraged. The faithful physician is a 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 147 

benefactor to the race. Opposition to the medical pro- 
fession is insane folly. In healing, to ignore the mental 
or the physical is unreasonable. 

Third. Healing is not a religion. Across the centuries 
healing has been surrounded by mysteries and super- 
stition. Disease was caused by goblins damned, and 
spirits of health cured disease. It was a battle between 
good and evil spirits. Medical science rescued the heal- 
ing of the sick from the supernatural. 

We now have our latter-day fads that endeavor to 
mix healing with religion. We hear such nonsense as 
faith cure, divine healing, and Christian Science. As 
the medical profession tore the mask of superstition and 
ignorance from the healing of disease in the past, so will 
mental science rescue the healing art from the quackery 
of religious cranks. 

The good Dr. A. J. Gordon, who wrote a book on heal- 
ing, was led into darkness. His book was unfortunate. 
Many of the cures that he related as supernatural were 
wild exaggerations. In his book, "The Mystery of Heal- 
ing," based upon the authority of Dr. Boardman, he re- 
lates this case : "A boy ten years of age fell and broke 
his arm. A surgeon was called, and the arm was band- 
aged. The next morning the boy said to his father : 
'please take off these bandages, my arm is well.' 'Oh 
no, my son, you will have to wear the splints several 
weeks.' 'Papa, do you believe in prayer? Last night 
I asked Jesus to cure my arm and He did it/ To please 
the boy the bandage was removed, and the arm was ab- 
solutely well." This story was related by Dr. Gordon 
to prove that the arm was miraculously healed. Dr. J. 
H. Lloyd, of Pennsylvania University, investigated the 
matter with the following results : 

The boy who had his arm broken was Carl Reed, who 
is now a physician in Chicago. Let him tell his story. 

"The broken arm was only a green-stick fracture of 
the forearm, and after having it bandaged several days 



i 4 8 MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

the splints were removed to please a spoiled boy. The 
bone would have united in a few days of its own accord. 
After the splints was removed, the arm was carried sev- 
eral days in a sling. This is the miracle. Some religious 
enthusiast started the story. I am that boy, and I do not 
crave this notoriety. Carl H. Reed." 

Any one can see that there was no miracle or super- 
natural power about this whole story. Nearly all the 
cures rehearsed by Dowie, Christian Scientists and faith- 
cure healers are exaggerated. The divine healers claim 
more than Jesus and the Apostles claimed. The friends 
of Jesus were sick. Thousands died all around him. He 
did not turn out a common healer. He performed these 
cures to glorify God. He taught the truth, then illus- 
trated it by a miracle. "This is my hand and my seal." 
Paul was sick. Timothy was sick, and Paul told him to 
take a remedy. Wine was a medical remedy in that 
day. Paul left his co-worker Trophimus sick at Melitus. 
Paul could not heal him or he would. He could only heal 
to show the power of God. Under both the Jewish and 
the Christian dispensations, God's servants used physical 
remedies. The great blunder of all the schools of divine 
healers is to think that gifts peculiar to the creative period 
of the church are to be found in the church today. There 
were gifts that belonged only to the apostolic days. Paul 
tells, i Cor. 13, that the gifts of prophecy, miraculous 
gifts of tongues, and supernatural power are to pass 
away. These powers have passed. If I want to preach to 
the barbarian now I must learn his language. God gave 
that power to the Apostles. If I want to heal the sick I 
must study mental and physical science and learn the art 
of healing. 

The divine healers make much out of the following 
scripture : 

"And these signs shall follow them that believe. In My name 
they shall cast out devils, they shall speak with new tongues, they 
shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing it shall 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 14$ 

not hurt them, they shall lay hands upon the sick and they shall 
recover." (Mark 16:17-18.) 

That this passage was fulfilled in the Apostolic day, 
is evident to all who are not wedded to fanatical notions. 
Peter raised the dead ; John healed the sick ; Paul took 
up a serpent. These powers were not to be given to all 
followers of Christ, neither were they to continue in all 
ages. Faith-healers and Christian Scientists invariably 
quote only part of this sentence. These things were to 
follow : 

1. Cast out devils. Can Christian Scientists do that? 

2. Speak with tongues. Do faith-cure healers do that ? 

3. Take up serpents. Who will try that now? 

4. Drink deadly poison. Will Christian Scientists try 
strychnine ? 

5. Lay hands on the sick. 

Out of the five points named these religious enthusiasts 
accept only one, laying hands on the sick, and that is a 
physical remedy. 

We will now quote their great proof, James 5 : 13-16. 

"13. Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? 
let him sing psalms. 

"14. Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the 
church ; and let them pray over him, annointing him with oil in 
the name of the Lord : 

"15. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord 
shall raise him up ; and if he have committed sins, they shall be 
forgiven him. 

"16. Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for 
another, that ye may be healed. .The effectual fervent prayer of 
a righteous man availeth much." 

From the above passage we have these conclusions : 
First. There were three things to be done, (a) pray, 
spiritual healing; (b) sing, mental healing; (c) annoint 
with oil, physical healing. The results to follow these 
three things were forgiveness of sins, and the healing of 
the sick. 

James commanded them to do just what any sensible 



150 MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 

physician would do. Prayer itself is curative. It pre- 
pares the mind for the reception of mental remedies. 
Physicians tell the attendants to be cheerful. Annoint- 
ing with oil is a physical remedy. Singing of songs was 
mental suggestion. So James told them to pray to pre- 
pare the mind for the reception of the mental suggestion, 
and then to use every remedy within their power. An- 
nointing with oil was the great medical remedy in that 
age. 

Christian Scientists refer to this passage as proof for 
their system. It is mere nonsense. They never annoint 
with oil, hence do not keep the injunction. All the 
Apostle told them to do was to use prayer for the for- 
giveness of sins, songs to ease the mind, and medicine 
to cure the body. 

Fourth. As a proper suggestion cures disease, so an 
adverse suggestion induces disease. There are three 
sources of adverse suggestion: (a) Self suggestion. 
Some people are always talking about their ailments, and 
studying symptoms. Such people are never well. An old 
lady said : "I always feel bad when I feel well, because 
I know I will feel bad the next day." When a man 
begins seriously to dissect himself mentally, he will 
soon be a fit subject for dissection. Wild animals are 
seldom sick. They cannot listen to adverse suggestion. 

(b) The newspaper literature on symptoms of dis- 
ease is a source of evil. The quack doctor fills the town 
with his literature, describing the symptoms of some dis- 
ease. The minds of men dwell upon these symptoms. 
Any one can imagine symptoms like those described, and 
in a short time they have symptoms. The women who 
go over the country giving private lectures to women, 
and heralding their great discoveries and cures create 
more sickness than they prevent. Every member of a 
woman's club had symptoms of a disease that had been 
discussed. Expectation brings on disease. 

(c) The chronic diet reformer induces indigestion 



MENTAL MEDICINE vs. DIVINE HEALING. 151 

and courts a diseased appetite. There is scarcely an 
article of food that has not been put under the ban of 
condemnation. The best diet for anyone is that which 
the appetite craves. 



CHAPTER X. 

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

The first person to attract attention on this continent 
ias a mental healer was Dr. Quimby, who was born in 
Maine in 1802. He had experimented in mesmeric and 
hypnotic treatment. He says : "When I mesmerized my 
'subject I could give him some little herb that had no 
medical property, and yet it would cure him." He there- 
fore concluded that the cure of disease was largely men- 
tal. He says, "I sat down by the patient, described his dis- 
ease, and told him his disease was in the mind. I exhorted 
Ihim to change his mind and be cured." This is the meth- 
od now used by the Christian Scientist. Dr. Quimby 
was the harbinger of Prophetess Eddy. In one of his 
books he says : "I deny disease as a truth, but admit it 
as a deception, started like other stories without real 
foundations and repeated until people believe there is dis- 
ease." 

Here again we see the marked resemblance of Chris- 
tian Science. He practiced mental healing in Portland and 
performed some remarkable cures. From 1862 to 1865 he 
had a noted patient — Mrs. Eddy — who was born 1821, 
in New Hampshire. She was first married to Mr. Glover 
of North Carolina. He died of fever. Widow life was 
not to her liking, and she married Dr. Patterson. While 
spending her three years with Dr. Quimby trouble arose 
between her and her husband and she was divorced from 
him. Trusting that the third time would be the charm, 
she in 1877 married Dr. Eddy, who died in 1882. Today 
Mrs. Mary Moss Baker Glover Patterson Eddy lives in 
her palatial home in the suburbs of Boston. 

Dr. Quimby died 1865, and in 1866 Mrs. Eddy had a 
revelation. How strange — as soon as her benefactor was 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 153 

dead Mrs. Eddy discovers Christian Science. Mrs. Eddy 
in 1887, states she was under the doctor's care from 1862 
to 1865, and that she believed herself healed. She wrote 
a nice poem upon the death of the doctor. Mrs. Eddy 
claims her system of healing was a revelation. She says: 
"In the year 1866 I discovered the science of healing and 
named it Christian Science. God has been fitting me for 
many years for the reception of this revelation." 

The system she declares was given her by God. Years 
before she heard voices calling her name. Her Science 
of Health, she tells us, "Is the Voice of Truth to the 
Ages." She is not noted for her modesty. Listen to her 
claims : 

1. My system is the first true one since the Apostles. 

2. All material sciences are false, philosophies are ab- 
surd, churches are unhelpful and unspiritual. 

3. She is divinely commissioned to save the world. 
But after all this claim it turns out that her system was 

not a revelation, and that Dr. Quimby was the originator 
of this system of healing. She stole Dr. Quimby's sys- 
tem and immediately labeled his mental healing "Chris- 
tian Science." 

She snatched the honor from the brow of her dead bene- 
factor, and labeled it in her own name. Christian Sci- 
ence appears before the public as an organized religion 
and as a system of healing. Like other delusions it must 
claim a divine origin. Hence Mrs. Eddy tells us that she 
heard the voice of the Lord, and she answered, "Speak, 
Lord, thy servant heareth." 

Although she claims her revelation was in 1866, the 
secret was hidden away in her brain till 1875, when her 
book, "The Science of Health" was published. Of this 
book she says : "No human pen or tongue taught me the 
science contained in this book, and neither tongue or pen 
can overthrow it." Hear her again : "Students are here 
instructed in the great mysteries of being, hidden since 



154 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

the foundation of the world," L,ook at some of the won- 
derful contents of this book: "God is all." "God is 
good." "God is mind." "God, Spirit, and all; nothing 
is matter." She informs us these truths will agree if read 
backward. Certainly they are as sensible read one way as 
another. She continues : "There is no mind in matter." 
Could stupidity be more stupid or folly more foolish than 
these vague conglomerations? Then think of 600 pages 
of these vagaries in this book, the "Science and Health." 
It had a charm for some because it is meaningless. 
The insanity of the system has gained many followers. 
Having followers does not prove that the book is true. 
What a piece of silly crudity is the Koran. Can any 
one read it and not realize that he is wading through a 
sea of nothingness ? What a task it is to read the mean- 
ingless pages of the Book of Mormon. Yet millions pin 
their faith to these books. He who pins his faith to the 
book of Mrs. Eddy under similar surroundings would 
accept the Koran. But for paradoxical comicality the 
Science of Health should be awarded the palm. Christian 
people sometimes say: "I believe in Christian Science." 
They mean by that they have some belief in the system of 
healing. No Christian can accept the religious system 
of Christian Science. It is antagonistic to Christianity. 
The Science of Health is in conflict with the Bible. There 
is no half-way station. We must accept the one and re- 
ject the other. Whom will you serve, the Prophet of 
Nazareth or the prophetess of Boston? Mrs. Eddy says 
there is no pain, sickness, sorrow, death, sin, or forgive- 
ness. Jesus says there is sin, sorrow, death, and forgive- 
ness. Mrs. Eddy says prayer hinders spiritual growth. 
Jesus says pray. 

Christian Science is unreasonable, unchristian, un- 
scriptural, unscientific and unhygienic. 

I. Unreasonable. Mrs. Eddy declares there is no pain. 
That all is mortal mind. Reason says there is pain. She 
treats disease, and yet declares there is no disease. If you 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 155 

are hurt, declare you are not hurt. Could anything be 
more stupid. "There is no poverty or misfortune." Here 
is a sure road to wealth. Just think you are rich. Pay 
$3.00 for Mrs. Eddy's book, and poverty and tears shall 
flee away. Hear her again : "Food neither strengthens 
nor weakens the body." Is dear mother Eddy willing to 
test this philosophy ? "The measurement of life by years 
robs youth, and gives ugliness to age." Never record 
ages. Timetables of birth an^ death are conspiracies 
against manhood and womanhood. Again: "This new 
system will make us younger at seventy than at seven- 
teen." This is almost as sensible as the Dutchman who 
said: "There is something funny about my two dogs. 
That little dog is bigger than that big dog." What do 
you mean? ''Why the little dog is the biggest." "Tut, 
tut," said his wife. "Hans don't know anything. When 
he says that little dog is bigger than the big dog, he means 
that the young dog is older than the old dog." This is 
Christian Science logic. Hear the prophetess on mar- 
riage. "It is possible in Christian Science to abolish mar- 
riage." Again, "Marriage is often convenient, sometimes 
pleasant, and occasionally a love affair." She has a wide 
experience, for she has been married three times, conveni- 
ently, pleasantly and lovingly, and yet she thinks it might 
reasonably be abandoned. A divine healer should not 
bury so many husbands. 

2. Christian Science is unchristian. Jesus the Prophet 
of God went about everywhere doing good. He had no 
place that he could call home. He loved and fed the poor. 

Mrs. Eddy sits yonder, in wealth and opulence, and 
lives in gaudy array. For her work she charges ex- 
horbitant rates. She charges $3.00 for the book, "The 
Science of Health." All healers must have it. It has 
gone through the 150th edition. For twelve half-day les- 
sons in her college she charged each pupil $300. Until 
the Massachusetts legislature put an end to her diploma 
giving she had an income of about $7,500 per day. She 



156 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

tells us, "At the time I closed my college there were 300 
students ready to enter the college." Her conscientious- 
ness about giving diplomas caused her to close the col- 
lege. The fact was Massachusetts law would have sent 
her to prison had she not closed her college. She says 
applications were flooding the college. Three hundred 
students at $300 each meant $90,000 in twelve days, or 
$7,500 a day. "My conscientious scruples about diplomas 
moved me to close my flourishing school." She had no 
conscience in the matter. Jesus went about healing with- 
out any reward. She boasts that her poor students 
quickly became rich. She tells her students to go to the 
great cities where they can accumulate more money. 
What a travesty upon Christianity. 

3. Christian Science teaching is unscriptural. 

From the valuable tract of W. J. Wright of Washing- 
ton, D. C, I appropriate the following: 

HERE IS THE GOD OE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

"God is the divine principle of all things." Light, love, truth, 
good are not attributes of deity, but the highest terms to express 
deity itself" (p. 171). "All is mind and mind is God" (p. 171). 
"The principle of divine metaphysics is God." "Life is God. God 
is the Supreme Being, the only intelligence of the universe, in- 
cluding man" (p. 226). "God is the principle of man" (p. 466). 
"There is only one principle, and this is God" (pp. 461-2). "Mind 
is God — man the full representation of mind" (p. 582). "God is 
a divine principle." "It is as Principle, not Person, that He saves 
man, instead of pardons him" (Index "S. and H."). "In one 
sense [yes, nonsense!] God is identical with nature." 

Thus we see that the God of Christian Science is Principle, 
not Person; identical with man, mind and nature! Mrs. Eddy 
says: "The human family have but one God — one mind — hence 
man and God are all of one." Then Mrs. Eddy is God and the 
rest of us are at least godlets ! And the world and beasts are all 
God! Quite as bad as the "Infidel's Creed": "I believe that 
there is no God; but that matter is God, and God is matter, and 
it is no matter whether there be a God or no." The God of 
Christian Science, according to its inspired (?) exponent, is the 
mongrel which results from crossing pantheism and individual- 
ism, mysticism and rationalism, materialism and transcendental- 
ism and spiritualism^ but not the Christian's God. 

What the Bible is to Christian Science may be seen in the 
foregoing teachings of Mrs. Eddy ; but I append a few specimens 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 



i57 



of her expositions and explanations. The first column is from 
the Bible, the second is what Mrs. Eddy says the Bible means : 



"Ho, every one that thirst- 
eth, come ye to the waters." 

"To preach deliverance to 
the captives." 

"For the trumpet shall 
sound." 

"In my flesh I shall see 
God." 

"Thy will be done on earth." 

"Deliver us from evil." 
"Destrov this temple." 
"Lay aside every weight." 
"Unto us a child is born." 



The call of Mrs. Eddy in 
"Science and Health." 

Deliverance from belief in 
their senses. 

The last call of Christian 
Science. 

I shall yet lose all faith that 
I have any flesh. 

Enable us to know that mind 
is all. 

Deliver us from belief in sin, 
sickness and death. 

Destroy my faith in the ex- 
istence of matter. 

Lay aside faith in your 
senses. 

A new spiritual idea is born 
to earth. 

Here are some definitions from her Bible Dictionary: 

Adam — Belief in original sin. Angels — God's thoughts passing 
through men. Baptism — Submergence in truth. Christ — Mental 
power. Devil — A belief in sin, sickness and death. Flesh — An 
error of physical belief. Holy Ghost — Christian Science. 

For absolute stupidity and unadulterated nonsense; for "in- 
accuracies, incongruities, contradictions, absurdities, tiresome 
iterations and reiterations, audacities, self-assertions and blas- 
phemies," the Book of Mormon has generally been assigned the 
first place ; but if the Bible is and means what Mrs. Eddy says it 
is and means, then it, and not some other book, is the Alpha and 
Omega of folly, the quintessence of imbecility and drivel, and fit 
to guide one to- no place but a home for idiots and other incur- 
ables. 

Furthermore, Christian Science in the following language 
denies the reality of sin : 

"Man is spiritual and perfect ; he is incapable of sin, sickness 
and death" (p. 471). "Evil is an illusion and error, and has no 
real basis. It is a false belief." "The real man cannot depart 
from holiness." "Man remains perfect" (p. 471). "Sin, sickness 
and death are without any real origin or existence" (p. 182). 
"Evil has no reality — it is neither person, place nor thing, but 
simply a belief, an illusion of material sense." 

All this being true, what a pity that Jesus did not know it! 
How sad that He should have worn Himself out in combating 
dreams and illusions which do not even represent realities ! How 
misleading and untruthful the statement: "Christ died for our 
sins according to the Scriptures !" How ridiculous His advent 
to earth ; how without doubt "a fool's errand" ; how certainly the 
herald of Don Quixote and other absurd visionaries ! 



158 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

But against all the above I put the following: "If we say we 
have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If 
we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word 
is not in us" (I John 1:8-10). And again, "Let God be found 
true, but every man [and one certain woman] a liar" (Rom. 3:4). 
Christian Science teaches that sin cannot be forgiven. Here 
is the language: 

"To seek salvation through pardon is to misinterpret God" (p. 
181). "There is no forgiveness of sin; we must pay the utter- 
most farthing" (p. 310). "We cannot escape the penalty due to 
sin." "God never pardons our sins" (pp. 311, 312). "Sin is not 
forgiven" (Vol. II, p. 265). 

So much for Mrs. Eddy. Look now at the Lord's side of this 
subject: "Our God will abundantly pardon" (Isa. 40:7). "Their 
sins and their iniquities will I remember no more" (Heb. 10:17). 
"The blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin" (I John 
1:7). "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to 
forgive our sins" (I John 1:9). "Even as the Lord forgave you, 
so also do ye" (Col. 3:13). When did the Lord become the 
author of confusion by putting forth these two contradictory 
revelations ? 

Again, according to Christian Science : 

"Prayer is useless," and "pleading with the divine mind is an 
'error which impedes growth" (p. 308). "Petitioning a personal 
Deity is a misapprehension of the sources and means of all bless- 
edness" (Vol. II, p. 170). "Audible prayer to a personal God 
hinders growth" (pp. 312, 394). 

As far apart as the zenith and nadir is this teaching from that 
of Jesus, the Author of Christianity. 

In view of all the foregoing, not a single rational reason can 
be shown for using the name "Christian" to describe the capri- 
cious, whimsical, extravagant, self-contradictory vagary of which 
Mrs. Eddy is the foster-mother — the unscientific, unchristian 
"Christian Science." It denies the personality of God; it denies 
the personality of Jesus and His Christly office, thus cutting itself 
off from the Christianity of the New Testament and branding 
its adherents as heretics. It denies the personality of the Holy 
Spirit, describing Him as "Christian Science," and Jesus as 
"mental power." It denies the personality of man, and yet makes 
man identical with God. It denies the reality, sinfulness and 
forgiveness of sin — these are but beliefs ; it denies the reality of 
sickness and death; it denies the reliability of the senses God 
has given us. In all this it is the spirit of Antichrist and must 
not be recognized by the church. It teaches us that though we 
cannot believe our eyes, ears and other organs of sense, we can 
and must believe Mrs. Eddy, even though on every page there 
is a multiplicity of reasons for questioning her sanity or honesty. 

The church should neither recognize the teachings of this 
woman as a revelation, nor the woman as inspired. The contra- 
dictory contents of "Science and Health" ; its provincial gram- 
mar; its rhetoric, which makes culture shudder; its philosophy, 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 159 

fit for a madhouse; its logic, which weeps for itself because it 
cannot hide its nakedness — all unite to mark it as "of the earth" 
and very earthy, and make it impossible for the church to blame 
such rashness and riot on the God of Israel. 

4. Christian Science is unscientific. To call her sys- 
tem of healing Christian is to dishonor Christ; to call it 
Science is an outrage against truth. 

When the mental malpractice of poisoning people was first 
undertaken by a mesmerist, to test that malpractice, I experi- 
mented by taking some large doses of morphine, to see if Chris- 
tian Science could not obviate its effect ; and I say with tearful 
thanks, "the drug has no effect on me whatever." The hour has 
struck : "If they drink any deadlv thing, it shall not hurt them." 
— Mrs. Eddy. 

This statement of Mother Mary Eddy is a falsehood. 
She knew she was a deceiver when she uttered it. Let 
any druggist give her a dose of strychnine and her man- 
sion will be for sale. Here she affirms she has taken poi- 
son. Silly people say, "How can you account for this?" 
A boy and a girl met a traveler who said, "Boy, what kin 
are you and that girl ?" He replied, "Her mother is my 
mother, and her father is my father, and yet we are no 
relation." The only way to account for this was the boy 
lied. They were brother and sister. Mrs. Eddy declares 
she has taken deadly poison. She told a wicked false- 
hood, and she knew that she perpetrated a falsehood. 
Does she dare stand the test ? 

In 1899 Dr. Charles Reed of Cincinnati made the fol- 
lowing proposition to Mrs. Eddy : 

Mrs. Eddy comes into the arena challenging the world to 
prove a negative. She closes her eyes to the fact that she has 
never proved the positive. On the contrary, her self-heralded 
wonders rest entirely on her own unsupported declaration, and 
that to me, and to a great many other people, is worth absolutely 
nothing. She should remember that even people who are not 
victims of vagaries such as hers, and whose every-day utterances 
do not toy so confusingly with the eternal verities as do hers — 
even such people are expected to bear the burden of proof when 
tney seek to tax credulity. I therefore demand the proof of this 
high priestess, and that the issue may be clearly drawn, I shall 
take up a few of her declarations: 



160 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

Mrs. Eddy says: "I healed consumption in its last stages, 
* * * the lungs being mostly consumed." 

I denounce this declaration as false, and challenge its sub- 
stantiation by competent and disinterested testimony. 

Mrs. Eddy says : "I healed carious bones that could be dented 
with the finger." 

I denounce this declaration as false, and challenge its sub- 
stantiation by competent and disinterested testimony. 

Mrs. Eddy says : "I have healed at one visit a cancer that 
had so eaten the flesh of the neck as to expose the jugular vein, 
so that it stood out like a cord." 

I denounce this declaration as false, and challenge its sub- 
stantiation by competent and disinterested testimony. 

* * * But if Mrs. Eddy has done all of these wonders, she 
can do them again. If she is so devoted to humanity in the altru- 
istic fashion that she proclaims, she will not hesitate to demon- 
strate her alleged "science" under circumstances that will give it 
the widest possible influence. To this end, if she will come to 
Cincinnati, I will place at her disposal cases of consumption, cases 
of cancer and cases of carious bones. She will have them under 
observation for such time as she shall determine, and she shall 
dictate all details of their management. They shall, however, be 
under the daily observation of a competent and disinterested 
person of my choice, but who shall have no voice in their man- 
agement, and who shall visit them only in my presence. If she 
by her Christian Science shall cure any one of them, I shall pro- 
claim her omnipotent from the housetop, and if she shall cure all, 
or even half of them, I shall cheerfully crawl on my hands and! 
knees that I may but touch the hem of her walking dress. If it 
will be more to the convenience of Mrs. Eddy, and she is not 
disposed to honor us with a visit, I shall take pleasure in endeav- 
oring through my friends to make a similar arrangement for her 
at Bellevue or some other New York hospital. If Mrs. Eddy 
will accept this challenge, and cure one or more of the cases, she 
will thereby demonstrate that she may be something more than 
either a conscienceless speculator on human credulity, or an un- 
fortunate victim of egoistic alienation. 

If Mrs. Eddy was not a fraud she would meet some 
of these challenges. In her miscellaneous writings she 
says, page 300, " Christian Science demonstrates that the 
patient who pays whatever he is able to pay for being 
healed, is more apt to receive than he who withholds a 
slight equivalent for being healed." 

How scientific this teaching, "I recommend students 
not to read the so-called scientific works." Ignorance is 
bliss. 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 161 

"Pood does not effect the life of man, but it would be 
foolish to stop eating, until we gain more goodness." 
When we get more of this system we can feed the race 
on goodness. 

"In the perfect day of understanding, we shall neither 
eat to live nor live to eat." This scientific prophetess 
tells us that broken bones have been set by mental sur- 
gery, but warns her followers to call a surgeon in case 
of dislocated bones. She knew that if healers attempted 
to heal a broken bone by mental energy, they would go 
to prison for malpractice, therefore she says to them : 

"Better leave broken bones to surgeons until the age 
admits the supremacy of mind.' 

5. Christian Science is unhygienic. 

The teaching of Christian Science is contrary to the 
laws of health. Some sayings of the prophetess : 

1. "It is morally wrong to examine the body to as- 
certain if we are in health." 

2. Christian Science never recommends hygiene." 

3. "Diet, exercise and bathing are unscientific." 

4. "Ablution of infants is unnecessary." Page 159. 
These are some of the wild opinions of this deluded 

woman. Christian Scientists get sick, suffer, and die 
just like other people. Their children are no more 
healthy than the children of others. They live no longer 
than those who reject the Christian Science system. 
What profit comes from the Christian Science? Mental 
science can perform every cure that Christian Science 
claims to perform. 

Christian Science never performed a cure, that is, the 
system of healing has no merit. Christian Scientists 
may have relieved pain just as a suggestion and mental 
healing have done. But the sys em is inferior to other 
systems. Mind cure is better, safer, and more sensible. 
Mrs. Eddy, though she has written many thousand pages, 
has never given the world one valuable idea. I challenge 
any one to point out one valuable thought in all her works. 



162 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

All that is good in her writings is old ; all that is new is 
bad. Instead of her writings being new thoughts, they 
are old thoughts, or no thoughts. Her teaching is bar- 
ren of any valuable information. Will Christian Scien- 
tists answer these questions: 

i. In what can Christian Science claim pre-eminence 
over mind-healing? 

2. Have not Pagan, Mohammedan, Mesmerist and all 
the schools of suggestion performed cures as wonderful 
as any performed by Christian Scientists long before Mrs. 
Eddy proclaimed her discovery? 

3. Do you deny that Dowie, the hypnotist, and men- 
tal healer can equal any of your cures ? 

4. If Christian Science is a Bible doctrine, why not 
use the Bible for text book? The Bible can be bought 
for 25 cents. Mrs. Eddy's book costs 300 cents. 

5. If Mrs. Eddy's teaching was a revelation, why re- 
vise these divine revelations? 

6. If Christ is a divine prophet, why organize a Chris- 
tian Science church. Is not Christ's church enough? 

If He is a divine teacher, why reject His teaching? 
Mrs. Eddy says she founded a church of her own. In 
that church she rejects the teaching of Christ, the Lord's 
supper and baptism. 

THE EVILS AND DANGERS OE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

Christian Science is death to spiritual life. Scientists 
become selfish and secluded. They are of little value to 
society. Their system of religion partakes largely of 
the selfish. They take but little interest in bettering the 
condition of those around them. I never knew one of 
them that wielded any force for good. They confine 
themselves to healing the body instead of saving men 
from sin. Substituting Mrs. Eddy's sayings for the say- 
ings of Christ, prayer, worship, and soul winning are 
neglected. This produces sad effect in their lives. It 
destroys sympathy and love. One of them writes : "Sick- 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 163 

ness and pain in my friends do not move me." Another 
says, "I care very little for the salvation of those around 
me, for all will come out all right, God cannot destroy 
himself." 

Christian Science is dangerous to Christianity; for it 
approaches its subjects when they are weak. When peo- 
ple are sick, they are easily influenced. They go to the 
bedside of the sick, look wise, talk foolish, and in this 
subtle way gain confidence. Paul speaks of these healers 
when he says: "They creep into houses and take cap- 
tive silly women." 2 Tim. 3 :6. Three-fourths of their 
patients are silly women. Mixing religion and healing 
these sick people are easily duped. Christian Science is 
a social evil. Christian Science endangers life. The 
healers will not co-operate with physicians. When the 
healer comes in the physicians go out. Mrs. Eddy sneers' 
at the doctors and tells her patients to choose between 
"Christ and catnip.' Christian Science is responsible for 
the death of thousands of children and helpless adults. 
There is scarcely a town in all this land but can point to 
the victims of Christian Science doctors. Graves of vic- 
tims due to the neglect of these fake healers dot nearly 
every cemetery. Where is the community that cannot 
relate one or more cases where children die with diph- 
theria from the neglect and the unreasonable theories 
of Christian Science? By refusing to use the means 
which God has given us, the threads of life have been 
permanently snapped. Multitudes sleep in the grave, 
who, had it not been for the delusion of this false so- 
called science, would today be in the enjoyment of life and 
health. 

When these fanatics refuse to aid babes and helpless 
adults they are guilty of manslaughter and should be 
punished. To refuse remedies is nothing short of murder. 

No ignorant quack should under the garb of religion 
be permitted to trifle with life. I saw a boy with a broken 
arm under the treatment of two healers. They were 



164 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

praying for God to help and heal the wound. They per- 
sistently refused to call a surgeon; when the humane 
society took hold of the case the child's arm was swollen 
to the shoulders. A short time ago a lady went out of Sc 
Louis on the train and her eight-year-old girl took the 
pneumonia. Her sobs could be heard by all in the coach. 
The conductor called a physician, but the mother said, 
"If God wants this child to live, it will live ; and if He 
wants it to die, it will die. I don't want any doctors 
around me." The doctor left the train. Rapidly the 
child grew worse and the conductor telegraphed for the 
officers of the humane society to take charge of the little 
girl at the next station. When the officers boarded the 
train the mother was quietly resting in her berth, and 
by her side was the little girl dead. The deluded mother 
meekly said, "My child has passed on." Here is murder, 
it may not be in the first degree. 

James Creelman, writing in the World, says: Not only has 
Mrs. Eddy, the thrice married and aged founder of the Christian 
Science movement, added more than $1,500,000 to her private 
fortune by directing the zeal of her followers and agents in her 
carefully organized money-making system, but the 5,000 profes- 
sional healers who ply their business in her name charge as much 
for "mental treatment" as regular physicians. 

The charges of the healers range from $1 to $10 for such 
treatment. Assuming that the average healer makes $5 a day, 
the total earnings of the 5,000 Christian Scientists, aside from 
f/ee patients, will amount to $5,475,000 a year. 

CHURCHES THE AGENTS. 

These millions go into the pockets of the healers. Mrs. 
Eddy's present income is largely confined to the sale of her books, 
each of the 700 Christian Science churches being an agency for 
their sale. If the ordinary layman should attempt to earn a 
living by practicing any art of healing he would, unless he was 
a regularly licensed physician, be liable to fine or imprisonment. 
Yet there are 5,000 unlicensed persons engaged in this lucrative 
business in the United States. 

It is this powerful business organization which enables Mrs. 
Eddy to live on her fine estate in New Hampshire and defy in- 
vestigation. From her luxurious residence she sends each year 
a "message to the mother church," written after the fashion of 
the apostolic epistles, but she carefully refrains from giving an 
account of the enormous private fortune she is accumulating. 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 165 

The fact that there are something like 250,000 members of 
her 700 churches, and perhaps 1,000,000 sympathizers, the great 
majority of them sincere believers, makes one shrink from the 
task of frankly characterizing those who are using a religious 
movement as a cloak for personal aggrandizement. But every 
step along the trail of Mrs. Eddy's work reveals the mercenary 
character of the close-mouthed and skillful combination which 
manages and controls the business end of Christian Science un- 
der the secret and absolute direction of the woman in New- 
Hampshire. 

SCIENCE REVEALED TO HER. 

Mrs. Eddy claims that Christian Science was revealed to her 
by God in 1866. There is in the resplendent "mother room" of 
her church in Boston a painting of the horsehair chair in which 
she sat when the divine communication was made. It is an ob- 
ject of profound reverence to her followers. 

But after this supposed revelation from God Mrs. Eddy went 
to live in Stoughton, Mass., where she claimed to be a disciple 
of Dr. Quimby, a hypnotic quack, whom she met in Portland, 
Me., in 1864. There are persons in Stoughton to-day who bear 
witness that Mrs. Eddy made no pretense in 1868, 1869 or 1870 
of having had a revelation from God. She was a teacher of Dr. 
Quimby's system of healing, and so declared herself. 

Even in 1881, when Mrs. Eddy established in Boston what 
she called the Massachusetts Metaphysical College, and taught 
4,000 pupils her art of healing, at $300 apiece for a three weeks' 
course, she made no attempt to shelter her business enterprise 
behind the name of a religion. 

HAD TO ABANDON COLLEGE. 

It was after the stern attitude of the Boston authorities had 
forced her to abandon her "college," with its illegal diploma mill, 
that the Christian Science church was founded, and Mrs. Eddy 
organized the system through which she has managed to sell 
250,000 of her $3 book, "Science and Health," the profits on 
which have yielded her at least $500,000, not to speak of her 
other books, which are sold through the church, its branches, its 
reading-rooms and its thousands of healers. 

In her earlier efforts to win followers Mrs. Eddy worked 
upon the fears of all whom she could reach by expounding the 
terrors of a sort of demonology or witchcraft In 1875 she wrote 
of these things in the first edition of the divinely revealed 
"Science and Health." 

It is impossible in a newspapej" to give the public any idea 
of Mrs. Eddy's literary work. There are miles and miles of it. 
When I was in Boston, two days ago, I was informed that as a 
sequel to the opposition to the three times married high priestess 
to marriage among her followers, she is now teaching the theory 
that the earth can be populated in the future by a mere act of 
the will. 



166 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

There are good people among the Mormons, Moham- 
medans and spiritualists, but that does not make wrong 
right. Because there are good people among them must 
not blind us to the fact that Christian Science is mis- 
chievous and harmful in all its tendencies. It is the 
duty of the pulpit to meet it in the open, and kill it instead 
of apologizing for it. 

I cannot better close this chapter than by quoting a 
paragraph from Rev. William P. McCorkle: 

Christian Science is both a foul imposture and a heresy, omin- 
ous of danger to the Church of Christ and of peril to immortal 
souls. It is a so-called science which ignores God-given facts; a 
philosophy which stultifies God-given reason; a religion which 
thrusts aside a God-given revelation; a theology which abol- 
ishes God while pretending to deify mortal man ; a religion which, 
after dishonoring Christ by every possible denial of His word, 
presents Him to us as a phantom Savior who disappeared more 
than eighteen centuries ago — a Savior who never did and never 
can save a soul, and who, having gone from earth, will never 
again return to bless His waiting and longing church. In a 
word, it is a philosophy without wisdom, a science without facts, 
a religion without rational worship, a theology without God and 
a Christianity without Christ. 

This new rehash of ancient heresies, not only in its name, but 
in its spirit and substance, fully merits the description of error 
long ago given by Paul, and once more makes timely his warn- 
ing to every man who bears a responsibility like that which 
rested on the young pastor of the church at Ephesus : Keep that 
which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain bab- 
blings^ and oppositions of science, falsely so-called, which some 
professing, have erred concerning the faith. 

The careful observer will say "amen" to the above ex- 
tract. Christian Science is a murderous delusion and a 
blasphemy upon Christianity. Send her to a speedy exe- 
cution for she has been convicted of murder. This black 
wart has cursed society too long. With the keen knife of 
science cut it to the heart ; with the sword of the spirit 
cut it to the core, and let it drop into coffined darkness 
and the abode of the dead. 



CHAPTER XL 

SOME; LATTER DAY DELUSIONS. 

But little needs to be said about John Alexander Dowie, 
the second Elijah, the restorer. There is nothing new in 
his healing methods. All of them have been explained in 
this book under the chapters on Hypnotism, Mental 
Medicine and Christian Science. He heralds his won- 
derful cures to all the world. He has wonderful experi- 
ment meetings in which his followers tell of their cures. 
But he never tells the deaths that occur in Zion. If he 
would report all that he fails to cure his paper would not 
contain the list. If the relapses would have an experi- 
ence meeting, they could fill any hall in Chicago. If some 
nervous woman under his hypnotic power feels improved, 
she is brought up to tell what the Lord has done. But 
when the hearse drives out of Zion the paper and pulpit 
are silent. 

Mrs. Eddy has lost three husbands by disease which 
she claims does not exist. Dr. Dowie's family has fared 
no better. He took his married daughter, Mrs. Steven- 
son, to England. On the return voyage she died on the 
boat and was buried in the sea. She was denied medical 
treatment, although she had the pneumonia. 

The nightgown of Miss Esther Dowie caught fire while 
she was curling her hair. She was severely burned. The 
prayers and the laying on of hands of Dowie did not save 
her. This calamity ought to have softened his flinty 
heart, but it did not. Standing above her dead body like 
a knave he said : "She disobeyed me. I forbade her to 
use alcohol in any form. (She used an alcohol lamp.) 
She violated my commands and she has been punished 
for it." Dowie is a monster. We believe that he is a 
money-getting wretch, a hypocrite ; who took the savings 
of the deluded ; killed many whom medicine would have 



168 SOME LATTER DAY DELUSIONS. 

cured; left to die those whom the knife of the surgeon 
would have saved; but here over the dead body of his 
own daughter the world expected some humanity and 
tender affections. The following case is reported in the 
daily papers: 

Chicago, May 23.— The body of Mrs. H. W. Judd, who died 
in agony a few days ago, in the presence of John Alexander 
Dowie and her husband, has been exhumed and an autopsy made. 
The woman was permitted to die without medical attention, 
Dowie and his Zion followers praying over her, while the hus- 
band looked on and sanctioned the prayer treatment. She was 
hastily buried, and Dowie, speaking to his followers at Zion 
tabernacle last Sunday, said in reference to the interference of 
the authorities : 

"Our sister died from the bursting of a blood vessel. If forty 
of these devils of doctors had stood around her bed she could 
never have been saved. Was I responsible for the blood vessel 
bursting? Am I God Almighty? My Bible tells me that in the 
case of Lazarus Jesus Himself failed to save." 

The autopsy has revealed the fact that the woman's life could 
probably have been saved had medical treatment been permitted 
at the proper time. The coroner's verdict will hold that the 
Dowie elders who were present when Mrs. Judd died are guilty 
of criminal negligence, and will set out that dozens of women 
are saved, almost every day, in like ailments. The Dowieites 
claim that the authorities are determined to break up their Zion, 
and will put up a stubborn fight. The grand jury now has the 
case, and will return indictments in accord with the finding of 
the coroner as based on the autopsy. 

Rev. J. O. Rose reports the following case: 
Mrs. Poppy of Kendallville, Ind., was afflicted with 
cancer. With the Dowie doctrine as her only hope and 
faith in his promises, she went to Chicago. Under his 
magnetic power she seemed to improve. She wrote home, 
"We are looking for a victory tomorrow." Dowie kept 
assuring her that he would soon perform a miracle. On 
the very day that she expected the victory a telegram 
from her daughter came saying, "Mother is much worse. 
Meet us at midnight train." She died in a few days. 
This with hundreds of others was never reported in his 
paper, the "Leaves of Healing." Dowieism is doomed. 
It cannot pass too soon. 



SOME LATTER DAY DELUSIONS. 169 



THEOSOPHY. 

Theosophy is one of the new religions and yet it is as 
old as Hindooism. In speaking of this subject Dr. F. S. 
Hoffman says : 

The case of Madame Helena Blavatsky, who astonished the 
world with her claim to telepathic power some years ago, should 
here be mentioned. Madame Blavatsky was a Russian lady of 
repute who, having developed a remarkable passion for travel 
in search of occult knowledge, and having visited alone several 
parts of the Orient that were supposed to be inaccessible to for- 
eigners, especially to women, came to New York in 1873 and 
organized the Theosophical Society. Her followers are num- 
bered by the thousands in this and other lands, being perhaps 
most numerous in India, where she spent many of her last years, 
though she died in London in 1891. It was claimed by Madame 
Blavatsk that the idea upon which her society was based had 
been revealed to her by telepathic messages from certain Mahat- 
mas, or "Brothers," who dwelt in the inaccessible fastnesses of 
the Thibetan Himalayas. She herself was simply their mouth- 
piece. These Brothers, she asserted, being far removed from all 
contact with ordinary mortals, by untold generations of austere 
simplicity in their mode of life and ceaseless cultivation of their 
spiritual faculties, had attained an insight into the secrets of 
nature and a knowledge of the processes of the cosmos that no 
effort of man could possibly acquire. The revelations that they 
had chosen to make to her were first published in New York in 
1877. Her now famous book containing them, with some exposi- 
tions of her own, bore the title of "Isis Unveiled." This book 
and the periodical called The Theosophist, which she edited, 
exerted so great an influence upon the world of thought that a 
society was formed in England in 1882, made up of eminent 
statesmen and scholars, to investigate her telepathic claims and 
other similar psychic phenomena. In 1884 the society employed 
Dr. Richard Hodgson to go to India, where Madame Blavatsky 
was at that time gaining many adherents, study the case thor- 
oughly, and report the facts. He found that the letters from 
Koot Hoomi, as the master of these alleged saints in the Thibetan 
Himalayas was called, upon which Madame Blavatsky^ based her 
new religion, were written by herself or at her dictation. They 
were so placed that they could be discovered at such an^ oppor- 
tune time as would convince her dupes of their ^ genuineness. 
Soemtimes these letters dropped down from the air, sometimes 
they were found in cushions and on trees, sometimes in the cor- 
ners of private drawers, or enclosed in envelopes as official tele- 
grams. 

Madame Blavatsky established a shrine in the headquarters 
of the sect at Adyar, India, where, it was alleged, notes to the 
brothers were answered almost instanter. Mr. Hodgson gives a 



i;o SOME LATTER DAY DELUSIONS. 

description of the shrine and its surroundings in his report It 
appears to have been a small cupboard placed against the wall 
between the occult room and Madame Blavatsky's bedroom. A 
slide in the wall enabled her to insert in the cupboard a proper 
answer to any note she might extract from it. To inquire into 
the working of the shrine was, of course, regarded by its de- 
votees as rank sacrilege. 

Mr. Hodgson gives the following from his own experience 
while in conversation with two of Madame Blavatsky's accom- 
plices : 

"At this moment something white appeared, touched my hair, 
and fell on the floor. It was a letter. I picked it up. It was 
addressed to myself. M. and Madame Coulomb were sitting 
near me and in front of me. I had noticed no motion on their 
part which could account for the appearance of the letter. Ex- 
amining the ceiling as I stood I could detect no flaw ; it appeared 
intact. On opening the letter I found it referred to the conver- 
sation which had just taken place." 

He afterwards ascertained that the letter had been inserted 
in a crevice in the ceiling with one end of a thread so loosely 
passed around it that when an assistant outside the room pulled 
the other end at a given signal the thread gave way and let the 
letter fall. 

From this and all the evidence we can gather on the matter 
we must conclude that the alleged telepathic communications of 
Madame Blavatsky with these so-called brothers were based on 
forgery and fraud. In fact, in her own confession to Mr. Solov- 
yoff she says herself in justification of her course: "What is 
one to do when in order to rule men it is necessary to deceive 
them?" 

The founder of this new cult was married at 17. Escaping 
from her husband after only a few months of married life, she 
became an adventuress, a Spiritualistic medium and a traveler. 
She absorbed the wisdom of the adepts of India, imbibed Hoo- 
dooism from the negroes of Louisiana, and learned magic from 
the medicine men of the Indians of Canada. She organized the 
Theosophical Society in New York in October, 1875. Madame 
Blavatsky directed the thought of this society to the doctrines 
of Indian occultism, and reported the appearance in New York 
of a Hindu Mahatma, who left a turban behind him as evidence 
of his astral visit. She went to India and established a shrine, 
from which were mysteriously issued answers to letters placed 
within its recesses, from which inaccessible facts were revealed 
and a variety of interesting marvels performed. Discords arose 
within her household and led to the publication by M. and Ma- 
dame Coulomb, her confederates, of letters illuminating the tricks 
of the trade by which the miracles had been produced. The 
report of the London society convicted "the Priestess of Isis" of 
"a long-continued combination with other persons to produce by 
ordinary means a series of apparent marvels for the support of 
the Theosophic movement," and concludes with these words: 



SOME LATTER DAY DELUSIONS. 171 

"For our own part, we regard her neither as the mouthpiece of 
hidden seers nor as a mere vulgar adventuress ; we think that she 
has achieved a title to permanent remembrance as one of the 
most accomplished, ingenious and interesting impostors in his- 
tory." Madame Blavatsky died in 1891, and her ashes were 
divided between Adyar, London and New York. 

Thus perished another imposter. Twice exposed as a 
fraud, yet she had followers. 

That the so-called brotherhood of Thibet was an inven- 
tion of Mrs. Blavatsky cannot be denied. She claims 
that this brotherhood through a long series of meditation, 
and high thinking, had established the fact that there 
is an astral plane upon which these dreamers walk. These 
meditating brothers can project their astral bodies 
through the air more rapidly than light can travel. One 
moment they can be in the mountain fastnesses of Thibet, 
and in a second in the room of the prophetess in Xew 
York. These astral agents carried letters to her, and re- 
vealed wonders that could not be seen by men on the phy- 
sical plane. But there are still higher planes for these 
spirits, so they die and are buried in the air. The heavens 
above us are therefore full of these shell-body cemeteries. 
When we take a balloon journey we are sure to run 
through one of these ghost graveyards. Mortals on this 
earth cannot understand these things only as they com- 
mune with Orientalism. The creed of Theosophy is very 
simple. They hold that all religions are equally valu- 
able. You can be a Jew, Mohammedan or Hindoo and 
be a Theosophist. 

Christianity does not necessarily enter into their re- 
ligion. Yet boasting of its liberality its hateful pur- 
pose comes to the surface and Theosophy declares the 
Yedic scriptures superior to the Bible and Buddhism in 
advance of Christianity. 

Theosophy is in doctrine and ethics Hindooism. It is 
a rehash of Oriental paganism. Y r et adventurers in the 
religious world accept it, look wise, talk silly and think 
they are advanced thinkers. 



172 SOME LATTER DAY DELUSIONS. 

No matter what fad or fake comes, there are de- 
votees to champion its cause. In the past religious de- 
lusions swayed judges, kings and courts; not so today. 
The public school, printing press, the pulpit, and not least 
the application of the laws of psychic phenomena to the 
solving of mysteries, are scattering fads and freaks and 
driving them to the dark valleys of ignorance. The fol- 
lowers of Christian Science and Faith Healers come from 
the ignorant and lower classes. The Dowies and Eddys 
of the future will have poor picking. 



CHAPTER XII. 

COMMON SENSE IN RELIGION. 

Religion and superstition are enemies, but it is difficult 
to divorce them. Mysticism has always surrounded re- 
ligion. Although Jesus came to reveal a rational system 
of religion, and in the face of the fact that the Spirit 
of God tells us that p- religion r "To visit the 
fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep him- 
self unspotted from the world," we have gone on mixing 
our religion with ghost stories and spirit manifestations. 

There is not one mysterious thing connected with 
Christianity. Jesus established a church. In a few sim- 
ple words he told men how to enter this religious society. 
The ritual for admission is one of the clearest ever 
given to men. All He said about admission into the 
church would not fill one-fourth of a column in one of 
our papers ; yet these plain statements have been twisted 
to suit the doctrines of men. 

Conversion has been made a mystery ; the change of 
heart an inc .prehensible t nsformation. Jesus and 
the Apostles never taught these mystical theories. Con- 
version means a change. Faith changes a man's intel- 
lect ; godly sorrow changes his affections ; and repentance 
changes his will. It is a simple process, an enlistment 
into the army of Christ. But religionists have surrounded 
conversion with the supernatural and mysterious. 

Dr. Buckley of New York, the greatest among the 
Methodists, says in his late book, page 60 : "It has been 
suggested that if faith healing can be accounted for by 
the law of suggestion, cannot conversion be accounted 
for in the same way? If by conversion you mean the 
cataleptic condition witnessed in revival meetings, I ad- 
mit that the phenomena are of natural origin. Trances, 
convulsions, tears are no part of conversion. They are 



174 COMMON SENSE IN RELIGION. 

the results of emotional excitement and not of divine 
origin." In speaking of this mysterious notion in re- 
vival meetings, President David Starr Jordan says : 
"Emotion is not religion. Hysteria in religion is danger- 
ous. Chronic religious excitement is destructive to higher 
life." 

The following extract is from Dr. Starbuck's late book, 
The Psychology of Religion : "The most glaring danger 
is found in emotionalism of religious revivals. Religion 
should not be submerged into the sea of feeling, but 
should be lifted within the range of intelligence. Re- 
ligionists are liable to color religious emotions and call 
them divine demonstrations. This unnatural state is 
dangerous to religion. In the early part of this century 
it was not unusual for whole communities to be caught up 
in the epidemic until some would have the "jerks," 
others go into trances, while others would become rigid. 
This phenomenon is sometimes now witnessed among 
some wild religionists. Shouting and jumping over the 
benches were common occurrences. Insensibility often 
followed these excitements. These so-called conversions 
seldom resulted in a reformation of life." That these 
manifestations are nothing more than religious frenzy 
cannot be denied. Witness the similarity between the 
hypnotist and the sensationalist in revival. The hyp- 
notist tells his subject to gaze at him and make a com- 
plete surrender. Then h repeats to the subject, "You 
are going to sleep." The evangelist says to his seekers, 
"Surrender all to Christ. He will come and save you. 
Wait for the feeling. God will speak to you." 

The appeals, songs, prayers and the suggestion from 
the preacher drive many into the trance state. I can re- 
member in my boyhood days seeing ten or twenty people 
lying unconscious upon the floor in the old country 
church. People called that conversion. Science knows 
it is a mesmeric influence, self-hypnotism. Wrought 
up to this high state of ecstacy the seekers in imagina- 



. COMMON SENSE IN RELIGION. 175 

tion see lights and hear voices. This they call conver- 
sion. In describing a great revival in Caneridge, Ky., an 
observer said: ''Some were prostrate upon the floor, 
others were crawling upon their hands and knees ; some 
were trance mediums, speaking in an excited manner; 
while on the outside of the house were scores lying un- 
conscious. They had swooned in the house and had been 
carried to the open air. Some of these people were un- 
conscious for hours, others did not seem to breathe. The 
excitement became an epidemic, and people who came to 
ridicule were attacked with the jerks." Any hypnotist 
can explain all this mysterious performance. It is sad 
that Christianity is compelled to bear the folly of such 
movements. 

It is eminently the duty of all sensible people to rescue 
Christianity from mysticism and fanaticism. In France 
a religious society called the convulsionists, became 
prominent. They met, shouted, sang and prayed until 
many fell into convulsions. These strange actions they 
called blessings from God. 

Any religious fake can find followers. Dr. Thomas 
Harris founded a community on Lake Erie and declared 
that he had been married to a spirit and that a child had 
been born of this union. He had enthusiastic followers. 
A divine healer in the south declares God has revealed to 
her that she will never die. A western "Affinity Hunter," 
after being several times married, declares he has. found 
his affinity, that children born of this union will never 
die. These freaks have followers. 

Dr. Buckley tells us that he knew a healer who prayed 
with a sick woman. When he arose from his prayers 
he shouted : "You will get well ; God told me you would 
recover; the Holy Spirit revealed this to me." The 
woman died in a few days. Dr. Buckley says : "God did 
not reveal this to him; he was an imposter and a blas- 
phemer." 



176 COMMON SENSE IN RELIGION. 

Many persons use the name of the Holy Spirit in a way 
that borders upon blasphemy. 

In the olden times the prophets and teachers came 
humbly. John the Baptist came dressed in coarse gar- 
ments, lifting up his voice in the wilderness. Jesus went 
about doing good, with no place that he could call his 
home. Peter the Hermit, barefooted and poorly clad, 
went forth to rally the people around the cross. The 
prophets and prophetesses of the twentieth century come 
to us in flying chariots and live in palaces. These im- 
posters see money in their plans. The Dowies, Eddys, 
Whites and Joseph Smiths have made religion a paying 
investment. No system of religion is too shameful to 
enlist recruits. The paradise of Mohammed suited the 
sensuality of the Arabian, and satisfied the thirst for blood 
in the Turk. "Plural Marriage" of the Mormon grati- 
fied the lust of men. But what is sad, these hideous 
things are done in the name of religion. The biggest 
fools in all the world are human beings, and the greatest 
fool among fools is the religious fool. This age demands 
common sense in religion. These false teachers tell us 
that there is no pain, suffering or death. Did Jesus suffer 
and die on the cross, or was He merely acting? The 
Word of God says He suffered and died. False prophets 
say there is no suffering. God's Word will stand though 
false prophets fall. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST A CURE FOR ALL DELUSIONS. 

For four thousand years the world has been look- 
ing down the centuries for the coming of a 
great national deliverer. Proph ts had foretold his 
coming ; poets had sung about him ; Rabbis had 
taught about him, and every Jew expected him. When 
he comes he shall be called the Wonderful 1 , the Coun- 
sellor 1 , the Mighty God 1 , the Everlasting Father 1 , the 
Prince of Peace 1 , the Rose of Sharon 2 , the Lily of the 
Valley 2 , the Chief among Ten Thousand 3 , the King of 
Glory 4 , the Law Giver and the Prophet 5 . We need no 
other counsellor, king or lawyer. Any law not given by 
his authority must be rejected. Jesus, the King of Kings, 
was to establish a universanl and an everlasting king- 
dom 6 . He will reign forever and ever 7 , and shall be for 
all generations. As a prophet he saw the future and gave 
law that would govern all people in all ages. It would 
supply the needs of the religious Jew, the learned Greek, 
the ignorant pagan, and the wisdom of the twentieth 
century. No prophet can divide honors with him, for 
all autnority is his. After his coming all prophets who 
claim divine revelation are false prophets, for to him 
will be given all power and dominion forever. 

When he came he was to save the people from their 
sins 1 and their souls from death 2 . When his kingdom 
shall triumph the desert shall blossom as a rose 3 , the lame 
shall leap, the dumb shall sing and sorrow and sighing 
shall flee away. If the plan of salvation of Jesus will 
deliver us from sin and death, and sorrow and crying, 
what more can be done? When the world accepts him 
no more is needed. He came heralded by uncounted 
multitude of angelic voices saying, "Peace on earth, 
and good will to men." The whole valley became one 
grand camping ground for the angelic hosts. The col- 

1. Isa, 9:6. 2 .Songs of S 2:1. 3. Sol. 5:10. 4 Isa. 33:22- 5. Deut. 

18:15. 6. Ban. 7:14. 7. Ps 114:13 

1. Math. 1:21. 2. Ps. 56:13. 3. Isa. 35:1, 6, 10. 



1 78 THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST. 

lected wisdom of heaven and earth united in casting its 
vote in electing Jesus king. When he began his ministry, 
he came as an authorative teacher. Moses said, "The 
Lord said unto you;" Gamaliel said, "Moses said unto 
you ;" Jesus came saying, "I say unto you." "Hear these 
sayings of mine." Again, "Hear ye him." He says, "All 
power is given unto me." If all authority is given to 
Him, other prophets have no authority. 

Jesus says, "I am the way, the truth and the life." 
Jesus is the truth, not a truth, or some truth, but all 
moral truth. As he could see the future he knew what 
the ages needed, and gave the truth to save the world. If 
all truth is from Jesus, Joseph Smith, Mrs. Eddy or Mrs. 
White has no truth to reveal. No philosopher, orator, 
or scholar has ever given to the world one single moral 
truth since the days of Jesus and his Apostles. I chal- 
lenge any so-called revelator to show one truth that has 
helped the world that Jesus and his executors did not 
teach. 

He, by the Spirit, was to lead the Apostles into all 
truth. Nothing more can be added. Not one single di- 
vine truth has been given to the world after the Apostolic 
period, and nothing is to be given until the coming of 
Christ. He was before Abraham and will be with his 
followers to the end of the world. By accepting him 
fully the race will be freed from sin, sickness, sorrow 
and death. Who can do more? Who wants more? 
Hear him, "if a man keep my saying he shall never see 
death." 1 "I am come that they might have life." 2 

"He that believes in me has eternal life." 4 If the world 
had accepted Jesus as king in the highest sense of that 
word, the race would have gained in Christ what it lost 
in Adam. But the people rejected him, and the complete 
triumph of his kingdom has not yet come. When the 
will of God shall be done here as it is in heaven, sickness, 
crying, sorrow, sin and death will flee away. Jesus came 
preaching the kingdom of God is at hand. By the king- 

1. John 8:51. 2 John 10:10. 4. John 6:17. 



THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST. 179 

dom of God he means an ideal world, a perfected soci- 
ety, where the will of God will be done on earth as it is 
in heaven. Blessed are the meek, not because they shall 
go to heaven, but because they shall inherit the earth. 

Hear the Apostle : "Though we or an angel from 
heaven preach any other gospel unto you than that which 
we have preached unto you, let him be accursed." 5 "If 
any man preach any other gospel unto you than that 
which ye have received, let him be accursed." Christian 
Science, Mormonism and kindred delusions preach an- 
other gospel, and the curse of God is upon them. 

In Christ we are complete. 1 If completeness is in 
Christ, nothing must be added. In these last days God 
has spoken to us by his Son. 2 The last days refer to the 
last revelation given by Jesus and the Apostles. Jesus is 
the same yesterday, today and forever. 3 His laws shall 
remain in force until the end of the race. Christ has 
given us a perfect law. 4 If a perfect law nothing can be 
added or subtracted. Jesus says : "I am Alpha and 
Omega, the beginning and the end." Then concluding 
his revelation to man he said : "If any man shall add 
unto these things God shall add unto him the plagues 
that are written in this book." Jesus was the end of 
the plan of redemption and nothing was to be added to 
it. Dowie, Mohammed, Smith and Eddy are false proph- 
ets and their followers are deluded. 

Paul tells us that the miraculous gifts of prophecies, 
tongues and supernatural knowledge shall pass away. 
They have passed. 

Some people are deluded by false prophets today. 
They come claiming divine power and quote the Savior 
as saying that his disciples shall do greater things than 
he had done. What had he done? He had healed the 
sick and raised the dead. Can any of the twentieth cen- 
tury prophets do greater things than that? Hence Jesus 
had no reference to physical works. Not one soul was 
redeemed until Jesus died and went to heaven. Then the 

L Col. 2:9. 2. Heb. 1:2. 3. Heb. 13:8. 4. James 1:25. 5. Gal. 1:8-9. 



180 THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST. 

transforming power of the gospel was to save men from 
sin and death. This work is as much greater than the 
physical, as eternal life is greater than earthly life, as 
God is greater than man. I here let J. O. Rose conclude 
the discussion of this subject. He has presented it in a 
forcible way, yet clear and terse. 

GREATER WORKS THAN CHRIST DID. 

"He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do 
also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go to 
my Father." (John 14:12.) 

What are these greater works than Jesus had performed? 

All those who believe in miraculous revelations and physical 
healings say these "greater works" are more miracles. 

Let us see what the Son of God and the Spirit of God say 
upon the subject. 

The time of this saying of Jesus was the night before His 
crucifixion. He was sitting at the last supper table with the 
eleven disciples. He is speaking of His death and departure from 
them. He proceeds to assure them of the presence and power of 
the Holy Spirit, who should descend from the Father when 
Jesus should ascend to the Father. 

In 14:17 He promises the Spirit should "be in" them. In 
14:26 He promises that the Spirit should "teach them all things, 
and bring all things to their remembrance, whatsoever I have 
said unto you." In 14:31 He says, "Arise, let us go hence." They 
are then described, from the fifteenth to the eighteenth chapters 
as walking and talking on their way from the "upper room" to 
the Garden of Gethsemane. In 15:26 He adds the promise that 
the Spirit "shall testify of me." In 16:7-11 He tells them defi- 
nitely what shall be the work of the Spirit upon the unconverted 
world. "When He is come He will convict the world of sin, of 
righteousness and of judgment." Jesus then says a very signifi- 
cant thing to them. "I have yet many things to say unto you, 
but you cannot hear them now." (16:12.) This shows that the 
revelation of Jesus' ministry was not a complete revelation. But 
He proceeds to give (16:13-14) a. wonderful promise: "Howbeit, 
when He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into 
all the truth; for He shall not speak from Himself; but what 
things soever He shall hear, these shall He speak; and He shall 
declare unto you the things that are to come. He shall glorify 
me, for He shall take mine and shall declare it unto you." 

A few items in our Savior's teachings are of supreme im- 
portance here: 

(1.) The supreme work of the Holy Spirit was to "teach," 
"speak," "declare" the whole truth of the New Testament of 
God our Father through Jesus Christ our Lord. 

(2.) These promises were fulfilled to the apostles and evan- 



THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST. 181 

geiists, beginning with the day of Pentecost in Acts, second chap- 
ter, and closing with the revelation of the complete New Testa- 
ment. In Mark 16:14-20 Jesus ''upbraids His eleven apostles 
with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed 
not them that had seen Him after He was risen." He com- 
mands them to preach the gospel to every creature. He promises 
them the signs that shall follow them if they believe. And after 
Jesus "was received up into Heaven, they went forth and 
preached everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirm- 
ing the word with the signs following." 

The miracles were signs of the pozver of God in the zvorks, 
which confirmed the authority of God in the w'ords. 

(3.) As certainly as Jesus kept His promise to His apostles, 
and as surely as the Holy Spirit performed His work, promised 
in their ministry, just so certainly is there no place for the pro- 
fessed miraculous revelations of modern "divine healers," "faith 
curers," "inspired apostles," etc. The Spirit was promised to 
"teach them all things, and bring to their remembrance all things 
whatsoever Jesus had said unto them," and to "guide them unto 
all the truth" of the New Testament revelation — not a part of 
it, but all of it. Did He do it? 

James 1:25 says that it is "the perfect law of liberty." Paul 
says (II Tim. 3:14-17) that it completely furnishes the man of 
God unto every good work. John testifies (Rev. 22:18-19) that if 
any man shall add to it or take from it, God shall punish him 
and "take away his part out of the book of life and out of the 
holy city." 

To assume the power of miraculous revelation is to assert 
that Jesus did not keep His promises and that His inspired apos- 
tles have not told the truth. 

He who believes the modern "fiealer" cannot believe the New 
Testament. 

Let us examine this claim (that the "greater works" than Jesus 
had performed were more miracles) in the light of / Cor. 12th 
and 13th chapters. 

Paul says in 12:1: "I would not that ye should be ignorant 
concerning spiritual gifts." In 12:8-10 he enumerates nine mirac- 
ulous spiritual gifts. In verses 29-31 he says, "Covet earnestly 
the best gifts, and yet show I unto you a more excellent way." 
Chapter 13 proceeds to reveal this more excellent way. In verses 
8-11, in contrast with the miraculous spiritual gifts which shall 
"fail," "cease," "vanish away," he places the non-miraculous 
gifts which shall "abide." These are "faith," which "comes by 
hearing the word of God" (Rom. 10:17) ; "hope," "which we have 
as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which 
entereth into that within the veil" (Heb. 6:19), and "love"; and 
as "perfect love casteth out all fear" (I John 4:17-18), "the great- 
est of these is love." 

The elements that are miraculous, having fulfilled their pur- 
pose in making and confirming a perfect New Testament of the 
Heavenly Father to His children, are no longer needed. 



i82 THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST. 

When once the Governor has confirmed a law by setting the 
seal of the State upon it and affixing thereto his name, and thus 
"witnesseth his hand and seal," to repeat the act would be but 
to weaken it. So when God, by the "signs and wonders" of His 
miracles, "confirmed the words of the apostles," He virtually said 
to the world, "Witness my hand and seal to my law" ; and to 
repeat the act would be but to weaken it and to distract the 
attention of His people from the law to the process of confirm- 
ing it. 

Paul says these miracles "fail," "cease," "vanish away." They 
do not abide. The non-miraculous "abide" until "faith" is swal- 
lowed up in sight, "hope" is fulfilled in glad fruition, and "love" 
shall cross the pearly portals of the house of. many mansions into 
the eternal presence of God, for God is love. 

The teachers of modern physical miracles not only contradict 
each other and the teachings of the apostles of Christ, but they 
make the supreme work of their religion consist in professed 
physical signs and wonders, and thus degrade their religion to a 
physical basis. 

The truth is, not a soul on earth could be saved from sin 
and death until Jesus conquered death and the grave and had 
returned to His Father's right hand to sit on the throne of His 
Kingdom. Up to the eve of His crucifixion His miracles had 
saved from physical death temporarily, but no more. Those 
whom He had raised from the dead must die again. "Christ is 
the first fruits of them that slept." "In Christ shall all be made 
alive" (i Cor. 15:16-23) from the grave. The Bible speaks of 
two deaths in consequence of sin — the physical death, or the sep- 
aration of the spirit from the body; the spirit death, or the sep- 
aration of the spirit from God forever. Not a soul on earth 
could be saved from eternal spiritual death till Jesus had gone 
through the gateway of the grave to His Father. Hence it was 
that His most agonizing cry on the cross of Calvary was the 
expression of His divine conception of the death into which He 
was entering — the unspeakable spiritual death, to which even the 
agony of His physical death was but an opening doorway. It 
was the sense of separation from God. "My God, my God, why 
hast Thou forsaken me?" (Matt. 27:46.) Thus, "we see Jesus, 
who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of 
death, crowned with glory and honor; that He by the grace of 
God should taste death for every man. For it became Him, for 
whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing 
many sons into glory, to make the Captain of their salvation 
perfect" — not through healings, but "through sufferings." (Heb. 
2:9, 10.) He was made perfect through sufferings, not as a man 
— He was a perfect man — but as a Savior for sinful men. 

Hence it was that the miracles of Jesus, which had com- 
manded all the forces of earth and sea and air, of heaven and 
hell, could not save a soul on earth from eternal spiritual death 
until Jesus had unlocked the gateway of the grave, had fulfilled 
the demands of infinite law, and demonstrated the power of 



THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST. 183 

salvation from eternal death by the infinite love of God, as He 
returned to His Father. 

The "greater works," therefore, which He promised to His 
disciples that they who believed on Him should accomplish, could 
not have been greater miracles. They were the works of the 
gospel of a crucified, buried and risen Savior (I Cor. 15:1-5). 
which Paul declares to be "the power of God unto salvation to 
every one who believes." (Rom. 1:16.) Not a prevention from 
physical death, but salvation from the eternal death of sin. It 
has never prevented any one from coming down to the grave 
since the death of Jesus. It has saved millions from the eternal 
spiritual death through the gateway of the grave. So Jesus says, 
"He that liveth and believeth on me shall never die." The 
"greater works" are the works of the gospel which regenerate 
and reform sinful men through faith in the risen Savior and 
obedience to His commandments, thus securing to them the re- 
mission of sins, the gift of the Holy Spirit and the promise of 
eternal life through the word of God's grace in Christ. 

What God in His providence will do for His children He has 
reserved to His own discretion, as His wisdom and love shall 
decide the details of His dealings with them in the journey and 
battle of life. We have to do with His revelation in the New 
Testament. He has promised to hear our prayer and answer 
"according to His will." (I John 5:14-15.) Not according to 
our will, but "according to His will," He will hear and answer in 
love. If He has concealed just what His answer shall always 
be, let us be assured that there is the same wisdom in what He 
has concealed as in what He has revealed. J. O. Rose. 

Warsaw, Ind., February 24, 1904. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

CONCLUSION. 

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter*. 

Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the 
whole duty of man. 1 

Henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro and 
carried about by every wind of doctrine. 2 

But beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy 
and vain deceit, and traditions of men. 3 

But be ye steadfast in all things, abounding in the 
works of the Lord. 4 

Give no heed to fables and endless genealogies, 5 for 
many have turned away into vain talking and have made 
shipwreck of their faith. 

Take heed that you be not like them and refuse to 
listen to old wives' fables. 6 

Keep that which is committed unto our trust, avoiding 
profane babblings. 7 

Foolish and unlearned questions avoid, for they en- 
gender strife. 8 

For the time has come when many will not endure 
sound doctrine, but have turned away from the truth. 9 

There are many vain talkers and deceivers whose 
mouths must be stopped, who are teaching false doctrines 
for the money there is in it." 10 

We should speak sound doctrine and grow strong in 
faith. A shepherd said his sheep never listened to 
a stranger's voice only when they were sick. When sick 
they would follow any strange voice. When the followers 
of Christ are studying the word of God, trusting in His 
promises, and leaning on His everlasting arm, they do not 
go off after these religious delusions and follies. Let 
them neglect the services of the Lord and they will go 
off after Spiritualism, Christian Science and other follies. 

1. Ec. 12:13. 2. rjh 4:14. 3. Col. 2:8. 4. 1 Cor. 15:58. 5. 1 Tim. 1:4. 
* 1 Tim. 4:7 and 6:20. 8. 2 Tim. 2:23. 9. 2 Tim. 4:3. 10. Thus Ml. 



CONCLUSION. 185 

Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the 
teachings of the divine writers for God has spoken unto 
us by his Son. We must heed Him, not the false prophets 
that arise deceiving even the elect in God. 

Having done all, stand, for the world is full of freaks, 
frauds, fads and fakes. Deceitful men and silly women, 
like the heathen Greeks are seeking after new things. 
They talk flippantly about new thought, the new religion, 
and psychic force. The need of the world is not twenti- 
eth century thought and a new religion, but first century 
thought and the old religion. Many club women think 
they are wise if they can spend their time in the field of 
advanced thinking, which means meaningless babbling. 
In the past we have had too much ignorance. We are 
now in danger of too much culture so-called. A cul- 
tured woman of today, means a woman who has never 
done one useful thing. 

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatso- 
ever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, what- 
soever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, 
whatsoever things are of good report ; if there be any 
virtue and if there be any praise, think on these things. — 
Phil. 4:8. 



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